t 


THE  JOURNALIST,  REFORMER  AKD  PHILANTHROPIST. 


THE  LIFE 


HOEACE  GrEEELEY; 


WITH 


GRAPHIC  NOTICES  OF  IMPORTANT  HISTORICAL  EVENT8; 

POLITICAL  MOVEMENTS,  AND  EMINENT  JOURNAL- 

ISTS,  POLITICIANS  AND  STATESMEN 


OF  His  TIMES. 


BY 

L.    D.    INGERSOLL,   ESQ. 


ILLUSTRATED  WITH  PORTRAITS  AND  OTHER  ENGRAVINGS. 


PHILADELPHIA: 

JOHN  E.  POTTER  AND  COMPANY, 

617  SANSOM  S  TRUST. 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1874,  by 

JOHN  E.  POTTER  AND  COMPANY, 
In  the  Office  of  the  Librarian  of  Congress,  at  Washington. 


PREFACE. 


SOON  after  the  death  of  HORACE  GREELEY,  I  was  advised  to 
write  a  biography  of  him.  I  had  occupied  much  time  for  many 
years  in  studies  preparatory  to  the  composition  of  a  historical 
work  upon  American  politics,  and  was  already  familiar  with 
most  of  the  events  of  Mr.  Greeley's  life.  I  felt  some  hesitancy 
in  undertaking  such  a  task,  believing  that  others  more  capable 
would  write  more  acceptably.  But  some  of  my  friends  urged 
the  matter  so  earnestly  that  I  finally  yielded  to  the  arguments 
which  were  advanced  in  behalf  of  a  biography  of  the  Great 
Editor.  The  result  is  herewith  submitted  to  the  public. 

I  have  not  written  so  much  for  scholars  and  men  of  letters 
as  for  the  people,  of  whom  HORACE  GREELEY  was  one.  He  was 
never  at  ease  in  polite  society ;  or,  it  might  with  more  exactness, 
perhaps,  be  stated,  polite  society  never  was  at  ease  with  him. 
He  was  ever  making  himself  vulnerabta  to  criticisms  of  eti- 
quette. In  delineating  his  life  I  shall,  perhaps,  be  guilty  of  a 
like  offense.  I  do  not  say  this,  to  deprecate  criticism,  but  only 
to  ask  a  candid  examination  of  the  object  with  which  the  volume 
has  been  written.  My  design  has  been  to  so  construct  the  work 
that  it  would  present  a  connected  series  of  portraits  of  Mr. 
Greeley,  in  his  multiform  manifestations  of  character  and 
genius,  rather  than  a  strictly  chronological  account  of  his  life, 
whereby  the  unity  of  time  would  be  preserved  in  the  penalty 
of  a  succession  of  broken  pictures.  *  I  have  also  endeavored  to 
present  him  as  he  was ;  not  a  single  character  in  a  monologue, 


PREFACE. 

but  surrounded  by  friends  and  encompassed  by  opponents ;  he 
and  they  fulfilling  their  destinies  together  and,  in  friendship  or 
in  antagonism,  controlling  events  and  making  history. 

Mr.  Greeley,  though  a  man  of  the  people,  was  a  reformer, 
a  politician,  a  statesman,  a  leader.  He  was  noted  as  a  philan- 
thropist, a  lecturer,  a  public  speaker,  a  journalist,  an  author. 
In  one  way  or  another,  he  impressed  his  influence  upon  most 
of  his  countrymen,  and  upon  much  of  his  country's  wisest  legis- 
lation. Of  a  man  so  remarkably  one  of  themselves,  the  people 
will  naturally  desire  to  learn  as  much  as  they  can,  as  soon  as 
they  can.  If  I  have  in  this  work  presented  them  with  the  true 
outlines  of  a  life  of  beautiful  simplicity,  of  real  grandeur,  of  vast 
influence  in  behalf  of  the  elevation  and  happiness  of  all  men ; 
and  have  also  shown  how  he  was  helped  by  those  with  whom 
he  labored,  and  how  many  of  his  desired  reforms  were  retarded 
by  those  who  opposed, — if  I  have  succeeded  in  truly  picturing 
forth  the  life  of  a  good,  a  great  and  an  honest  man,  though  not 
a  perfect  character,  my  labors  will  not  have  been  in  vain. 

THE  AUTHOR. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTEE    I. 

HORACE  GREELEY'S  BIRTH  — ANCESTRY— BOYHOOD. 

Birth  of  Horace  Greeley — Ancestry;  Father,  Grandfather,  Great-grand- 
father—  His  Mother,  Mary  Woodburn  —  Her  Energy,  Stories,  Good 
Nature  — The  Woodburn  Family— Of  the  Scotch-Irish  Race  — The 
Puritans  Fond  of  Fun  —  Birth-place  —  Learns  to  Read  Books  Upside 
Down  —  First  School  Days  —  A  Prodigy  at  Spelling  —  Hard  Work  on 
the  Farm  —  Old  Fashioned  New  Hampshire  Hospitality  —  The  Greeley 
Family  sold  out  of  House  and  Home 17 

CHAPTEE    II. 

APPRENTICESHIP. 

Removal  of  the  Ruined  Family  to  Vermont  —  Poverty  of  the  Manly 
American  Sort  —  Vermont  Schools  —  Horace  Keeps  a  Sort  of  Night 
School  —  An  Omnivorous  Reader  —  "  Clearing  "  Timber  Lands  —  Flea 
Knoll  —  The  Ague  —  A  Respected  Poor  Family  —  Review  of  Farmer- 
Boy  Life  —  Horace  chooses  the  Printer's  Trade  —  Apprenticeship  at 
Poultney  in  the  Northern  Spectator  Office  —  Dramatic  Account  of  the 
Contract  —  Family  Remove  to  Western  Pennsylvania —  A  Sad  Part- 
ing—  Horace  as  a  Printer — An  Authority  in  Politics  and  General 
Knowledge  —  Anecdotes  —  An  Excellent  "  Checker  "  Player  —  His 
Uncouth  Toilet  —  Takes  Down  a  "Swell"  —  Sends  His  Earnings 
Home  —  Journeys  to  Pennsylvania  —  First  Essays  in  Writing  —  A 
Fugitive  Slave-Chase  —  Fiftieth  Anniversary  of  Independence  —  Learn- 
ing a  Trade  Better  than  a  College  Education 81 

CHAPTEE    III. 

A  JOURNEYMAN  PRINTER. 

Departure  from  Poultney  —  Visits  his  Father  —  Works  as  a  Journeyman 
at  Jamestown  and  Lodi,  New  York — Chopping  Wood  Again  —  Em- 
ployed on  the  Erie  (Pennsylvania)  Gazette  —  Offered  a  Partnership; 


CONTENTS. 

Declines— Returns  To  His  Father's  — In  Vain  Tries  to  Procure  "Work 
in  the  West  —  Resolves  to  Go  to  New- York  — Divides  his  Earnings 
with  his  Father  —  The  Journey  to  New -York  —  Arrival  There  with  a 
Cash  Capital  of  Ten  Dollars  — Diligent  Search  for  Work  —  Sets  up  a 
"  Lean  "  New  Testament  —  Chicken-pox  Proof — Varied  Experience  as 
a  Journeyman  in  the  Great  City  —  Steady  Progress  —  Visits  New 
England  —  Business  on  his  own  Account 51 

CHAPTEE    IY. 

SOCIAL  MORALS  —  FAITH  —  POLITICS. 

Horace  Greeley  a  Born  Reformer  —  A  New  England  Pioneer  of  Tern- 
perance  —  Opposition  to  the  Use  of  Tobacco  —  His  Religious  Faith  — 
His  Own  Statement  as  to  How  He  Became  a  Universulist  —  A  Very 
Young  Politician  —  Discussion  of  the  Slavery  Question  in  181&-20 — 
An  Anti-Slavery  Boy  — The  "Era  of  Good  Feeling"  — Era  of  Per- 
sonal-Preference Parties  —  Election  of  John  Quincy  Adams  to  the 
Presidency  —  The  "  Anti  -  Mason  "  Excitement  —  Jackson  Elected 
President  in  1828  — Defeat  of  Henry  Clay  in  1832  — Horace  Greeley 
Goes  into  Business  for  Himself. 62 

CHAPTER   V. 

BUSINESS  VENTURES  IN  NEW -YORK. 

Partnership  with  Francis  V.  Story  —  A  Bank  Note  Reporter  and  The 
Morning  Post  —  Failure  of  the  Penny  Daily — Dr.  Shepard  —  Mr 
Schols  —  Weathering  the  Storm  —  Partner  Drowned  in  East  River  — 
Mr.  Jonas  Winchester,  next  Partner  —  The  New-Yorker  —  The  City 
Political  Contest  of  1834  —  Prints  and  Partially  Edits  a  Campaign 
Paper  —  A  "Grahamite"  Boarding -House  —  Marriage  —  Clay,  Cal- 
houn,  Crittenden  —  Severe  Struggle  with  the  Hard  Times  of  1837  — 
The  New-Yorker  Continued,  though  burdened  by  Debts  —  Finally  It 
Goes  Up  in  .Flame  and  Smoke 76 

CHAPTER   YI. 

CHIEFLY  OF  THE  "LOG -CABIN"  CAMPAIGN. 

The  Presidential  Election  of  1836— "Old  Hickory "  — Greeley's  Opinion 
of  Martin  Van  Buren  —  Thurlow  Weed  Calls  en  Mr.  Greeley  — The 
Latter  Induced  to  Take  Charge  of  a  "  Campaign"  Paper  at  Albany  — 
The  Jefferson ian— A  Model  Political  "Organ"  — The  Graves  and 
Cilley  Duel  — Success  of  the  Whigs  in  New  York  State  — William  H. 
Seward  Elected  Governor  — The  Remarkable  Presidential  Campaign 
of  1840  — The  Harrisburgh  Conveption  — Nomination  of  General  Har- 
rison—" Tippecanoe  and  Tyler  Too  "  —  Log-Cabins  and  Hard  Cider— 


OOHTENTS. 

Mr.  Greeley  Edits  The  Log -Cabin  Newspaper  —  Its  Character — Pro- 
digious  Success  —  The  Nation  Aroused  —  Notices  of  Some  of  the  Most 
Noted  Orators — Triumph  —  The  Death  of  President  Harrison  —  Mr. 
Greeley  Determines  to  Establish  a  Daily  Journal  in  New- York 85 

CHAPTER.   VII. 

FOUNDER  OF  THE  NEW -YORK  TRIBUNE. 

Resum6  of  Public  Journalism  up  to  the  Time  of  the  New- York  Tribune  — 
The  Partisan  Press  —  "Organs"  —  Noted  Party  Editors:  Isaac  Hill, 
Thomas  Ritchie,  Edwin  Croswell,  Duff  Green,  Andrew  Jackson,  Amos 
Kendall,  Francis  P.  Blair,  John  C.  Rives;  "The  Kitchen  Cabinet "  — 
The  National  Intelligencer  —  Gales  and  Seaton  —  Charles  Hammond; 
George  D.  Prentice  —  New -York  Journalism  Goes  to  the  Front — The 
Six -Penny  Journals  —  William  C.  Bryant,  James  Watson  Webb,  and 
Other  Journalists  of  the  Old  Regime  —  The  Cheap  Press  —  The  New- 
York  Sun  —  The  Herald  and  James  Gordon  Bennett  —  The  Herald 
Originally  a  Journal  Without  Principle  —  A  Newspaper  Vacuum 
Thereby  Caused  —  Horace  Greeley  Establishes  The  Tribune,  Price  One 
Cent  —  Its  Early  History  —  Mr.  Thomas  McElrath  —  Character  of  The 
Tribune  —  Devoted  to  the  Welfare  of  the  People  —  Welcomes  All  New 
Ideas  — Success 103 

CHAPTER   VIII. 

THE  TRIBUNE— HISTORY— EDITORS  AND  CORRESPONDENTS. 

Early  Successes  of  The  Tribune  —  Contest  with  The  Sun  —  Henry  J.  Ray- 
mond, First  Assistant  Editor — Establishment  of  The  Weekly  Tribune — 
Its  Remarkable  Success — The  Era  of  Newspaper  Expresses  —  Foreign 
News  and  Correspondence  —  Distinguished  Correspondents,  at  this 
Time  and  Afterwards,  of  The  Tribune  —  Bayard  Taylor ;  Margaret 
Fuller;  Thomas  Hughes;  Emilio  Castelar;  *M.  D.  Conway;  G.  W. 
Smalley ;  Kane  O'Donnell — Notable  Associate  Editors  of  The  Tribune — 
Charles  A.  Dana;  George  Ripley;  Solon  Robinson;  William  H.  Fry; 
George  M.  Snow ;  and  Others  —  Hearty  Accord  of  All  with  Mr.  Gree- 
ley's  General  Views  —  A  Journal  Earnestly  Devoted  to  the  Welfare  of 
the  People  —  The  Feniniore  Cooper  Libel  Suits -„- ..119 

CHAPTER    IX. 

SOCIALISM  AND  OTHER  "ISMS." 

Mr.  Greeley's  Socialism  —  His  Mature  Views  as  Set  Forth  by  Tlimself — 
The  Famous  Discussion  With  Mr.  Raymond  —  The  Effect  of  Mr 
Grecley's  Supposed  Opinions  Upon  New -York  Journalism  —  Estab- 
lishment of  The  Times  —  "  Grahamism  "  —  Spiritualism  —  J'enny  Lind 


CONTENTS. 

Attends  "the  Rappings"  at  Mr.  Greeley's  House  —  Summing  up  of 
His  "Isms." 146 

CHAPTEK   X. 
FINAL  DEFEAT  OF  HENRY  CLAY. 

The  Presidential  Campaign  of  1844— Henry  Clay  the  Whig  Candidate  for 
President — Other  Candidates — "The  Clay  Tribune"  —  Mr.  Greeley's 
Labours  with  Tongue  and  Voice  —  George  D.  Prentice  of  the  Louisville 
Journal  —  An  Animated  Campaign  —  Defeat — Mr.  Greeley  Greatly  Dis- 
satisfied with  the  Result — His  Opinion  of  Henry  Clay." 160 

CHAPTEK    XI. 

CONTINUATION  OF  TRIBUNE  HISTORY. 

The  Tribune  and  Literature — Inaugurates  A  New  Era  of  Criticism — Ed- 
gar A.  Poe — A  High-Priced  Autograph  —  The  Tribune  Brings  Out  the 
Transcendentalists —  Margaret  Fuller;  Her  Contributions  to  the  Trib- 
une—  Mr.  Greeley's  Tribute  to  Her  Genius — Notices  of  American 
Female  Journalists — Charles  Dickens  —  Mr.  Greeley's  Early  Recogni- 
tion of  his  Genius — His  First  Visit  to  America — Washington  Irving's 
"Break  Down"  at  the  Dickens  Dinner — Mr.  Dickens's  Second  Visit — 
Mr.  Greeley  Presides  at  the  New- York  Dinner — A  Notable  Gathering 
—  Mr.  Greeley's  Great  Services  to  Literature  —  Contributions  of  Tribune 
Writers  to  Permanent  Literature 168 

CHAPTEK   XII. 

ERA  OF  THE  MEXICAN  WAR— GEN.  TAYLOR,  PRESIDENT. 

The  Tribune  from  1844  to  1848— Its  Era  of  Irrepressible  Conflicts— Rapid 
Review  of  its  Battles*— Moves  on  to  Anti-Slavery  —  Its  Hostility  to  the 
War  with  Mexico — Enthusiastic  Sympathy  with  Popular  Movements 
in  Europe  —  "  Slieve-gammon  "  —  Tribune  Office  Burned  —  Mr.  Gree- 
ley Visits  the  West— The  Presidential  Campaign  of  1848— Mr.  Gree- 
ley Dissatisfied  with  the  Nomination  of  General  Taylor — Declines 
to  Support  the  Ticket—  Speech  at  Vauxhall  Garden  —  Nominated  for 
Congress — Taylor  and  Clay 188 

CHAPTEK   XIII. 

A  MEMBER  OF  CONGRESS. 

Elected  to  Congress  for  "  a  Short  Term  "  —  His  Opinion  of  the  Chaplaincy 
—  Land  Reform  —  The  Famous  Congressional  Mileage  Expose — Ani- 
mated Debates— Tilt  with  "Long  John"  Wentworth  on  the  Tariff 


CONTENTS. 

Question  —  A  Lively  Debate  on  Congressional  Books — Speech  on  Re- 
cruiting in  the  Army —  Speeches  on  the  California  and  New  Mexico 
Bills — The  Last  Night  of  the  Session  —  "War  Between  the  North  and 
South  Begun  " —  Some  of  His  Distinguished  Fellow-Members : — Messrs. 
Winthrop;  Lincoln;  Collamer;  Giddings;  Schenck;  Horace  Mann; 
Andrew  Johnson;  Ashmun;  Wentworth;  Cobb;  R.  W.  Thompson; 
Jacob  Thompson ;  George  W.  Jones,  of  Tennessee ;  Stephens ;  Toombs ; 
Botts;  John  S.  Pendleton;  and  others— Address  To  his  Constituents  — 
Congress  Then  and  Now 205 

CHAPTER    XIY. 

VISITS  EUROPE. 

Crossing  the  Atlantic  — The  Great  Exhibition  at  London  — A  Juror— 
Sight-seeing  —  Mr.  Greeley's  Opinion  of  London —  His  Opinion  of  tha 
English  and  American  Press — Visits  Paris — Views  of  Parisian  Morals 
and  Social  Life  —  Predicts  the  Stability  of  the  Republic  —  Journey  to 
Lyons  —  Palaces  and  Potatoes  —  Proceeds  to  Italy  —  Sardinia — Rome 

—  St.  Peter's  and  the  Coliseum  —  The  People — Journey  to  Venice — 
Switzerland  —  Germany  —  Belgium  —  Paris  Again — Returns  to  London 

—  Glances  at  Scotland  and  Ireland  —  Opinion  of  the  English  People 

—  Home 231 

CHAPTER   XV.    • 

ON  THE  PLATFORM— REVISITS  EUROPE. 

Mr.  Greeley  On  the  Platform  —  His  First  Lecture :  "Human  Life" — His 
Style  of  Public  Speaking — Publishes  a  Volume  of  Lectures  and  Es- 
says, Entitled  "  Hints  Towards  Reforms "  —  Declines  to  Address  a 
Literary  Society  —  Characteristic  Letter — A  Letter  Misinterpreted — 
Does  Not  "Fail  to  Connect" — Agricultural  Addresses — The  Indiana 
Agricultural  Fair  of  1853  — Mr.  Greeley's  Address— The  Night  Ride 
on  a  Hand-car  —  Revisits  Europe  —  Several  Weeks  of  Leisure — Two 
Days  in  a  French  Prison — His  Amusing  Account  of  His  Incarceration 
— Switzerland  and  the  Glaciers — A  Presentiment — Return  to  America. 
260 

CHAPTEE   XVI. 

CAMPAIGN  OF  1852— THE  WHIG  PARTY  EXIT. 

The  Dawn  of  a  New  Political  Era— The  Political  Canvass  of  1852— The 
Nominations  —  Mr.  Greeley  Mildly  Supports  General  Scott,  and  "Spits 
Upon  the  Platform  "  -^  His  Individual  Platform — A  Lively  Campaign 
Terminating  in  Utter  Rout 285 


CONTENTS. 

CHAPTEE   XVII. 
MR.  GREELEY  AND  THE  NEW  POLITICAL  ERA. 

Review  of  Mr.  Greeley's  Past  Political  Life  — Of  tlie  Parties  of  the  Times 
— The  Day  of  Small  Things — The  Compromise  Measures  of  1850 — 
Mr.  Greeley's  Opinion  of  Them  —  Renewed  Agitation  of  the  Slavery 
Question — The  Political  Influence  of  Mrs.  Stowe's  Novel,  "Uncle 
Tom's  Cabin  "  —  Of  the  Public  Press — Mr.  Greeley  Departs  on  the  New 
Departure 290 

CHAPTER   XVIII. 

1854  TO  1860. 

Mr.  Greeley  in  the  Political  Contests  of  the  Time — The  Renewal  of 
Slavery  Agitation — The  Kansas-Nebraska  Struggle  —  Messrs.  Sumner, 
Chase,  Wade,  Seward,  Fessenden — The  Know-Nothing  Party — Mr. 
Greeley  opposes  it — "The  Banks  Congress"  —  Mr.  Greeley  Assaulted 
— General  Banks  —  Organization  of  the  Republican  Party  —  The  Fre- 
mont-Buchanan Campaign — Defeat  of  the  Republicans — The  Kansas 
War  —  "Lecompton"  —  Senator  Douglas  Defends  Popular  Sovereignty 
—  Senator  David  C.  Broderick,  of  California — Edward  D.  Baker — The 
Lincoln-Douglas  Debates  —  The  Tribune  on  the  Side  of  Douglas  —  Mr. 
Greeley  Travels  Overland  to  California — Extracts  from  His  Letters  — 
Buffaloes,  Prairie-Dogs,  and  Indians — Life  at  Denver  in  1859  —  Brig- 
ham  Young  and  Mormonism  —  Honours  in  California — Receptions  and 
Addresses — The  Yosemite — The  Pacific  Railroad  —  Return  —  John 
Brown 296 

CHAPTER   XIX. 

THE  QUADRILATERAL  CAMPAIGN  OF  1860. 

The  Division  of  Parties  in  1860 — Rupture  of  the  Democratic  National 
Convention  at  Charleston,  South  Carolina — The  Chicago  Convention 
— Popular  Enthusiasm — Mr.  Greeley  a  Delegate  from  Oregon — Sup- 
ports Edward  Bates  for  President — He  Defeats  Mr.  Seward's  Nomina- 
tion—  "Greeley  at  the  Tremont,  Weed  at  the  Richmond  House"  —  Mr. 
Weed's  Chagrin — Eminent  Men  of  the  Convention:  Thomas  Corwin; 
David  Wilmot;  William  M.  Evarts;  Joshua  R.  Gicldings;  Carl  Schurz; 
John  A.  Andrew;  Cassius  M.  Clay;  and  others — The  Imbroglio  Among 
New- York  Politicians  —  Mr.  Raymond,  from  Auburn,  Assails  Mr. 
Greeley  —  The  Famous  Letter  Dissolving  the  Finn  of  "Seward,  Weed 
and  Greeley"  —  Mr.  Weed's  Wisdom  —  Two  Democratic  Tickets  Nom- 
inated—The "Bell-Everett"  Ticket  — The  Candidates  —  The  Cam- 
paign—  Success 337 


COMTENTS, 

CHAPTER   XX. 

HOME  LIFE. 

Horace  Greeley  at  Home— An  Unpretending  Hou$ehold •—  Margaret  Ful- 
ler's Description  of  Mr.  Greeley's  Home  —  His  Personal  Habits  —  Toilet 

—  Food— His  Hospitality— Tenderness  for  His  Children  —  The  Death 
of  "Pickie  "  —  His  Taste  as  to  Home  Adornments  —  Buys  a  Farm.  357 

CHAPTER   XXI. 

HORACE  GREELEY,  THE  FARMER 

His  Love  of  Rural  Life— But  Not  of  Ox-Life  —  His  Wife's  Judgment 
Principally  Consulted  as  to  The  Farm  Site  —  Chappaqua —  A  Descrip- 
tion of  the  Place  —  The  First  Forest  Home  There  —  Mr.  Greeley's  Mode 
of  Improving  the  Place  —  His  Practical  Farming  —  The  Later  Home 

—  General  Facts  as  to  his  Farmer-Life  —  His  Work  Entitled  "  What  I 
Know  of    Farming"  — The    Subject  of   Innumerable   Jests — Their 
Effect  Upon  Him..... 372 

CHAPTER   XXII. 
THE  WAR  OF  THE  REBELLION  BEGUN. 

The  Election  of  Abraham  Lincoln  Made  a  Pretext  for  War — Mr.  Greeley's 
Opinion  upon  the  Right  of  Secession  —  He  Demands  a  Vote  of  the  South 
eru  People,  Expressing  a  Willingness  to  Abide  by  the  Result  — A  Reply 
to  Mr.  Thurlow  Weed's  Assertion  that  Mr,  Greeley  was  a  Secessionist — 
A  Candidate  for  United  State  Senator  —  The  Tribune  During  the  Early 
Part  of  the  War — "On  To  Richmond!" — Mr.  Fitz  Henry  Warren's 
Washington  Letters  —  The  Washington  Extemporaneous  Club  of  Critics 

—  The  Defeat  of  Bull  Run— Its  Cause  — Ml-.  ^Greeley  "Stampeded"  — 
Messrs.  Dana  and  Warren  Retire  from  The  Tribune  —  Secretary  Stanton 

—  His  Letter  to  Mr.  Greeley  —  Organizes  Victory  for  the  Union  Arms 
—The  Policy  of  The  Tribune. 387 

CHAPTER   XXIII, 
THE  WAR  OF  THE  REBELLION  CONTINUES. 

Correspondence  with  President  Lincoln — The  Mob  of  1863  —  Mr.  Lincoln 
Re-elected  President —General  McClcllan  the  Opposing  Candidate  — 
General  Fremont  and  Montgomery  Blair  Withdraw  —  Mr.  Greeley's 
Peace  Negotiations  —  The  Rebel  Negotiations  —  The  Military  Cam- 
paigns of  1864-65  under  Grant  and  Sherman — Victory — The  Death  of 
President  Lincoln—  Horace  Gieeley's  Opinion  of  Him  as  aWar  Presi- 


CONTENTS. 

dent —  President  Andrew  Johnson  —  Mr.  Greeley  Undertakes  to  Bring 
About  a  Reconciliation  Between  the  President  and  Congress  —  The 
President  Impeached  —  Failure 404 

CHAPTEE   XXIY. 

HORACE  GREELEY  AND  JEFFERSON  DAVIS. 

Jefferson  Davis,  Escaping  from  Richmond,  Is  Captured — Confined  at 
Fortress  Monroe  —  Impracticability  of  Trial  —  Horace  Greeley's  Inter- 
view  with  Senator  Wade,  of  Ohio,  on  the  Subject  of  Bailing  Mr.  Davis 

—  Mr.  Greeley  is  Dissuaded  from  the  Project  —  But  at  Length  Finally 
Resolves  to  Go  Upon  the  Bond — Visits  Richmond  for  that  Purpose — 
The  Scene  in  the  Court  Room  —  Mr.  Greeley's  Richmond  Speech  — 
Effect  of  this  Act  of  Magnanimity  Upon  the  Public 427 

CHAPTEE   XXV. 

MORE  HISTORY  OF  THE  TRIBUNE. 

More  of  The  Tribune's  "  Isms  "  — Proudhon  —  Endorses  the  Principle  of 
the  "Woman's  Rights"  Reform — Advocates  Labour  Reform  —  Asso- 
ciation Adopted  in  The  Tribune  Office  —  An  Era  of  Energetic  Idium 

—  A  Description  of  The  Tribune  Establishment  —  How  the  Paper  is 
Edited  —  Mention    of  Tribune  Writers  —  The  Composition  Room  — 
Press  Room  —  Counting  Room  —  The   "Weekly"  Day  —  Resum6  of 
Tribune  History  from  Its  Beginning 439 

CHAPTEE    XXVI. 

THE  AUTHOR  OF  BOOKS. 

Mr.  Greeley  in  Permanent  Literature  —  His  Labours  on  Political  Manuals 

—  Edits  a  Life  of  Henry  Clay  —  "  Hints  Towards  Reforms  "  —  "  Glances 
at  Europe  "  —  "  Overland  Journey  to  California  "  —  "  What  I   Know 
of   Farming"  —  "The  American    Conflict"  —  A  Work   Upon    Polit- 
ical Economy  —  "Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life" — Estimate  of  Mr. 
Greeley  as  an  Author 487 

CHAPTEE   XXVII. 

1868  TO  1872. 

The  Presidential  Campaign  of  1868  —  Nomination  of  General  Grant  by 
the  Republicans  and  of  Horatio  Seymour  by  the  Democrats  —  Mr. 
Greeley  Supports  General  Grant  —  The  Canvass  —  Success  of  the 
Republicans  —  President  Grant's  First  Cabinet — He  Secures  the  Wrath 
of  Professional  Politicians  —  Mr.  Greeley  at  First  Sustains  the  Admin. 


CONTENTS. 

istration  —  A  Candidate  for  Congress  Against  S.  S.  Cox  —  The 
"  Revenue  Reform "  Movement  —  The  Formation  of  a  New  Party 
Undertaken  —  The  Ideas  of  Its  Representative  Men  —  Mr.  Greeley 
Not  at  First  in  the  Movement 507 

CHAPTEE   XXVIII. 

A  TOUR  OF  THE  SOUTH. 

Mr.  Greeley  Visits  Texas  —  An  Account  of  this  Southern  Tour  —  He 
Emphatically  Assails  "the  Carpet-Baggers"  as  a  Class  —  The  Effect  of 
the  Tour  Upon  His  Political  Opinions 519 

CHAPTEK   XXIX. 

A  CANDIDATE  FOR  PRESIDENT  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES. 

Organization  of  the  Liberal  Republican  Party  —  Preliminary  Tactics  — 
Debates  in  the  Senate  —, Eminent  Republicans  Join  in  the  Movement — 
The  Cincinnati  Convention  —  Candidates  for  Nomination  —  Mr.  Gree- 
ley Successful  —  The  National  Democratic  Convention  at  Baltimore  — 
The  Cincinnati  Ticket  Endorsed — The  Republican  National  Con- 
vention and  its  Candidates — The  Canvass — Death  of  Mrs.  Greeley — 
Defeat— At  Work  Again  on  The  Tribune 530 

CHAPTER  XXX. 

LAST  ILLNESS,  DEATH,  AND  FUNERAL. 

Mr.  Greeley  Suddenly  Prostrated  by  Alarming  Illness — The  Public 
Interest  in  the  State  of  His  Ailment — His  Death  from  Disease  of  the 
Brain — Circumstances  Attending  His  Last  Hours — The  Causes  of 
His  Death  Manifold — Work,  the  Criterion  of  Age — His  Funeral — 
Attended  by  the  President  and  Members  of  the  Cabinet,  the  Vice- 
President  and  Many  Eminent  Men — The  Procession  to  the  Grave — 
A  City  in  Mourning. , 557 

CHAPTER  XXXI. 

TO  SUM  THE  WHOLE  —  THE  CLOSE  OF  ALL. 

Rcvie-wof  the  Private  Life  and  Public  Services  of  Mr.  Greeley  —  Estimate 
of  His  Genius  —  His  Character  —  The  Services  He  Rendered  His 
Country  and  Mankind  —  A  Friend  of  the  Labouring  Man,  One  of  the 
People,  a  Great,  a  Good,  and  an  Honest  Man,  though  Not  a  Perfect 
Character..  ..597 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS. 


MM 

STEEL  PORTRAIT  OF  HORACE  GREELEY. Frontispiece. 

HORACE  GREELEY'S  BIRTHPLACE. 22 

HORACE  GREELEY'S  FIRST  SCHOOL 30 

HORACE  GREELEY'S  ARRIVAL  IN  NEW  YORK 50 

THURLOW  WEED 61 

JAMES  GORDON  BENNETT 75 

HENRY  J.  EAYMOND 84 

FIRST  MEETING  OP  HORACE  GREELEY  WITH  THURLOW  WEED 88 

GRAND  POLITICAL  BARBECUE  OF  1840 100 

WILLIAM  CULLEN  BRYANT 118 

SARAH  MARGARET  FULLER 167 

CHARLES  A.  DANA 204 

WHITELAW  KEID 289 

HARRIET  BEECHER  STOWE 295 

GENERAL  EDWARD  D.  BAKER 336 

WILLIAM  H.  SEWARD 340 

J.  EUSSELL  YOUNG 356 

DR.  CHARLES  H.  RAY 371 

HORACE  GREELEY'S  LATE  HOME  AT  CHAPPAQUA 372 

THE  CLUMP  OF  EVERGREENS 376 

THE  HOUSE  IN  THE  WOODS 378 

HORACE  GREELEY  IN  HIS  ORCHARD 384 

MURAT  HALSTEAD 386 

ABRAHAM  LINCOLN 388 

EDWIN  M.  STANTON 400 

SAMUEL  BOWLES 403 

THE  TRIBUNE  BUILDING,  PRINTING-HOUSE  SQUARE,  NEW  YORK 438 

HORACE  GREELEY'S  EDITORIAL  ROOM 452 

FACSIMILE  OF  HORACE  GREELEY'S  PENMANSHIP 480 

JAMES  GORDON  BENNETT,  JUN 486 

M  ANTON  MARBLE 506 

ALLEN  G.  THURMAN 529 

JOHN  W.  FORNEY 547 

THE  BODY  OF  HORACE  GREELEY  LYING  m  STATE  IN  THE  CITY 

HALL,  NEW  YORK 550 

THE  FUNERAL  PROCESSION 564 

DUST  TO  DUST 556 


THE 


OnAPTEE   I. 
HORACE  GREELEY'S  BIRTH— ANCESTRY  — BOYHOOD. 

Birth  of  Horace  Greeley  —  Ancestry;  Father,  Grandfather,  Great-grand, 
father  —  His  Mother,  Mary  Woodburn  —  Her  Energy,  Stories,  Good 
Nature— The  Woodburn  Family— Of  the  Scotch- Irish  Race  — The 
Puritans  Fond  of  Fun  —  Birth  -  place  —  Learns  to  Read  Books  Upside 
Down  —  First  School  Days  —  A  Prodigy  at  Spelling — Hard  Work  on 
the  Farm  —  Old  Fashioned  New  Hampshire  Hospitality  —  The  Greeley 
Family  sold  out  of  House  and  Home. 

HORACE  GREELEY,  who  became  the  founder  of  the  New- York 
Tribune,  the  most  eminent  journalist  of  his  times,  and  one  of 
the  most  useful  and  distinguished  of  men,  was  born  February 
3d,  1811,  in  the  town  (called  township  in  many  parts  of  the 
United  States)  of  Amherst,  Hillsborough  county,  New  Hamp- 
shire. He  was  the  third  of  seven  children,  of  whom  the  two 
elder  died  before  his  birth. 

The  father  of  Horace  was  Zaccheus  Greeley,  the  mother 
Mary  Woodburn,  and  they  had  been  married  about  four  years 
when  the  little  stranger  who  was  destined  to  become  so  cele- 
brated first  opened  his  eyes  to  the  light  of  day.  Holy  "Writ 
informs  us,  in  a  text  that  has  perplexed  many  minds,  that 
God  visits  the  iniquity  of  the  fathers  upon  the  children  unto 
the  third  and  fourth  generation  of  them  that  hate  Him ;  which 
is  but  a  forcible  way  of  saying  to  a  nation  of  rude  men,  more 


18  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GEEELET. 

easily  persuaded  through  fear  than  otherwise,  that  like  pro- 
duces like.  It  is,  after  all,  but  the  enunciation  of  a  law  of 
nature  believed  to  be  universal.  Notwithstanding  certain 
modern  hypotheses  stated  with  wonderful  ingenuity  and  subtle- 
ty, there  has  yet  been  no  demonstration,  or  approach  to  it,  that 
corn  ever  produced  anything  but  corn,  fruits  anything  but 
fruits,  apes  anything  but  apes,  man  anything  but  man.  The 
good  and  ill  qualities  of  races,  families,  individuals,  descend 
from  father  to  son  no  less  certainly,  though  not  always  so  pal- 
pably, as  wheat  springs  from  wheat.  Horace  Greeley  had  the 
advantage  of  an  ancestry  of  industrious,  frugal,  honest,  respect- 
able, Christian  families,  both  on  the  side  of  his  father  and 
mother  for  several  generations.  Three  brothers  named  Gree- 
ley (spelled  nearly  as  many  different  ways  as  the  name  of 
Shakespeare)  migrated  to  America  from  Nottingham,  England, 
twenty  years  after  the  landing  of  the  Pilgrims  at  Plymouth 
Rock.  One  of  them  settled  in  Maine,  where  there  are  many 
descendants;  another  in  Rhode  Island;  the  third,  in  Massa- 
chusetts, near  the  southern  line  of  New  Hampshire,  into  which 
State  his  descendants  soon  migrated.  "  The  Greeleys  of  our 
clan,"  says  Mr.  Greeley,  "  while  mainly  farmers,  are  in  part 
blacksmiths.  Some  of  them  have  in  this  century  engaged  in 
trade,  and  are  presumed  to  have  acquired  considerable  property ; 
but  these  are  not  of  the  tribe  of  Zaccheus."1 

"  My  grandfather  Greeley,"  he  continues,  "  was  a  most  ex- 
cellent, though  never  a  thrifty,  citizen.  Kind,  mild,  easy-going, 
honest,  and  unambitious,  he  married  young,  and  reared  a 
family  of  thirteen,  of  whom  he  who  died  youngest  was  thirty 
years  old;  while  a  majority  lived  to  be  seventy,  and  three  are 
yet  living  (1868),  at  least  two  of  them  having  seen  more  than 
eighty  summers.  *  *  A  devoted,  consistent,  life-long  Chris- 

•Kecollections  of  a  Busy  Life,  p.  34.  Mr.  Parton,  in  his  Life  of  Horace 
Greeley,  speaks  of  "  Old  Captain  Ezekial "  Greeley  in  anything  but  com- 
plimentary  terms,  and  makes  him  out  as  having  been  the  great  journalist's 
great-grandfather.  Mr.  Greeley  himself  expressly  says,  a  few  lines  above 
the  words  just  quoted  from  him,  that  his  father,  grandfather,  and  great- 
grandfather each  bore  the  name  of  Zaccheus.  He  doubtless  knew  wfc<r  Ki« 
great-grandfather  was  as  well  as  any  one  else. 


HIS  MOTHEK.  19 

tian, — originally  of  the  Baptist,  but  ultimately  of  the  Meth- 
odist persuasion, — exemplary  in  deportment  and  blameless  in 
life,  I  do  not  believe  that  my  grandfather  Greeley  ever  made 
an  enemy;  and,  while  he  never  held  an  office,  and  his  property 
was  probably  at  no  time  worth  $2,000,  and  generally  ranged 
from  $1,000  to  zero,  I  think  tew  men  were  ever  more  sincerely 
and  generally  esteemed  than  he  by  those  who  knew  him." 
This  excellent  and  amiable  man  died  in  his  fulness  of  days, 
aged  ninety-four.  "We  shall  presently  see  that  his  son  Zaceheus 
— the  father  of  Horace — inherited  the  amiable  qualities  of  his 
immediate  ancestor  as  well  as  the  faculty  of  reaching  the  zero 
point  in  the  acquisition  of  property;  the  occasion  which, 
demonstrated  the  latter  quality  being  certainly  one  of  the  sad 
dest  in  the  young  days  of  Horace  Greeley's  life.  The  father 
died  in  December,  1867,  aged  eighty-six,  of  which  long  life 
forty-two  years  had  been  spent  in  or  on  the  verge  of  New  Eng- 
land, and  the  remainder  in  his  long  retained  home  in  Western 
Pennsylvania,  whereof  he  had  been  one  of  the  great  band  of 
hardy,  industrious  pioneers  who  cut  down  our  American 
forests,  let  in  the  sun,  and  open  the  way  for  the  triumphs  of 
civilization  and  progress. 

Horace  Greeley's  mother  was  a  woman  oi  remarkable  nature. 
She  had  great  strength  of  body  as  well  as  of  mind.  Though 
lacking  in  education,  she  had  a  natural  refinement  and  delicacy 
of  sentiment  whose  beauty  and  loveliness  could  not  be  con- 
cealed by  her  toilet  of  home-spun,  nor  lost  in  the  drudgery  of 
a  hard-working  destiny.  "My  mother,"  says  Mr.  Greeley 
himself,  in  that  admirable  series  of  Recollections  which  he 
contributed  to  the  New- York  Ledger  in  1868,  "having  lost  her 
mother  when  but  five  years  old,  was,  for  the  next  few  years, 
the  especial  prot6g6e  and  favourite  of  her  aged  grandmother, 
who  had  migrated  from  Ireland  when  but  fourteen  years  old, 
and  whose  store  of  Scottish  and  Scotch-Irish  traditions,  songs, 
anecdotes,  shreds  of  history,  etc.,  can  have  rarely  been  equalled. 
These  she  imparted  freely  to  her  eager,  receptive  granddaugh- 
ter, who  was  a  glad,  easy  learner,  whose  schooling  was  better 
than  that  of  most  farmers'  daughters  in  her  day,  and  who 
naturally  became  a  most  omniverous  and  retentive  reader 


20  LITE  OF   HORACE  GEEELEY. 

There  were  many,  doubtless,  whose  literary  acquisitions  were 
more  accurate  and  more  profound  than  hers ;  but  few  can  have 
been  better  qualified  to  interest  or  to  stimulate  the  unfolding 
mind  in  its  earliest  stages  of  development."  She  is  described 
as  tall,  muscular,  well-formed,  with  the  strength  of  a  man 
without  his  coarseness,  active  in  her  habits,  delighting  in  hard 
work,  with  a  perpetual  flow  of  animal  spirits,  and  the  heartiest 
good  will  toward  all  living  things.  "  She  worked,"  writes  an 
informant  of  Mr.  Parton,  "  indoors  and  out  of  doors.  She 
hoed  in  the  garden;  she  laboured  in  the  field;  and  while  doing 
more  than  the  work  of  an  ordinary  man  and  an  ordinary 
woman  combined,  would  laugh  and  sing  all  day  long,  and  tell 
stories  all  the  evening." 

In  describing  a  visit  to  the  father's  Pennsylvania  homestead 
in  1830,  Mr.  Greeley  says:  uThe  cabin  which  my  father  had 
bought  with  his  land  was  nothing  to  brag  of.  My  mother — 
born  half  a  century  after  the  log-cabin  stage  of  London- 
derry— could  never  be  reconciled  to  this,  nor  to  either  of  the 
two  rather  better  ones  that  the  family  tenanted  before  it 
emerged  into  a  poor  sort  of  framed  house.  In  fact,  she  had 
plunged  into  the  primitive  forest  too  late  in  life,  and  never 
became  reconciled  to  the  pioneer's  inevitable  discomforts.  The 
chimney  of  the  best  log-house,  she  insisted,  would  smoke;  and 
its  roof,  in  a  driving,  drenching  rain,  would  leak,  do  what  you 
might.  I  think  the  shadow  of  the  great  woods  oppressed  her 
from  the  hour  she  first  entered  them;  and,  though  removed 
but  two  generations  from  pioneer  ancestors,  she  was  never 
reconciled  to  what  the  less  roughly  bred  must  always  deem 
privations  and  hardships.  I  never  caught  the  old  smile  on 
her  face,  the  familiar  gladness  in  her  mood,  the  hearty  joyful- 
ness  in  her  manner,  from  the  day  she  entered  those  woods 
until  that  of  her  death,  nearly  thirty  years  later,  in  August, 
1855.  Though  not  yet  sixty-eight  she  had  for  years  been  worn 
out  by  hard  work,  and  broken  down  in  mind  and  body.  Those 
who  knew  her  only  in  her  later  years,  when  toil  and  trouble 
had  gained  the  victory  over  her,  never  truly  knew  her  at  all." 

Such  were  the  father  and  mother  of  Horace  Greeley.  His 
great-grandfather  on  the  mother's  side  was  John  Woodburn, 


THE  PUETTAN8.  21 

one  of  the  original  Scotch-Irish  settlers  of  Londonderry,  New 
Hampshire.  He  had  allotted  to  him  a  tract  of  120  acres  of 
land  in  1721.  and  upon  this  farm  Horace  Greeley's  mother 
was  born,  and  there  she  was  married  to  Horace  Greeley's 
father.  The  farm  is  still  in  possession  of  the  "Wbodburn 
family,  though  no  price  was  ever  paid  for  it,  nor  has  a  deed  of 
it  ever  been  given,  or  at  any  rate  had  not  at  the  time  Mr. 
Greeley  prepared  his  "  Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life."  The 
earliest  settlers  of  this  portion  of  New  Hampshire  were  from 
Londonderry,  Ireland,  and  are  generally  described  as  Scotch- 
Irish — a  race  of  fervid  religious  feelings,  hard  work,  and 
notable  pugnacity.  Some  of  the  original  colonists  had  actually 
participated  in  the  famous  siege  of  Derry,  and  others,  too 
young  to  fight,  had  been  eye-witnesses  of  that  remarkable 
exhibition  of  undaunted  courage  and  sublime  fortitude — 
courage  and  fortitude  which,  perhaps,  secured  success  to  the 
English  revolution  and  gave  the  final  victory  to  the  Protestant 
cause.  Others  still  of  the  colonists  and  their  families  had 
heard  the  story  of  the  siege  many  times  told  by  actual  par- 
ticipants. Hence  we  may  infer  that  the  martial  spirit  was 
strong  among  Horace  Greeley's  ancestors ;  exhibited  in  him, 
in  the  pluck  and  vigour  with  which  he  overcame  difficulties  and 
oombatted  opponents.  These  Scotch-Irish  colonists  and  their 
descendants  were  no  less  noted  for  patriotism  than  for  reli- 
gious principle.  Many  of  them  were  distinguished  in  the  old 
French  war — 1756-1763 — and  the  subject  of  this  sketch 
records  with  evident  pride  that,  "  from  first  to  last,  London- 
derry furnished  34:7  soldiers  to  the  Revolutionary  armies, 
while  her  whole  number  of  adult  males  cannot  have  much 
exceeded  500." 

Not  only  were  these  people,  among  whom  were  Horace 
Greeley's  ancestors,  good  fighters  in  their  country's  cause, 
devotedly  religious,  industrious,  and  frugal,  but  they  were  not 
the  gloomy,  world-despising  race  which  they  have  been  too 
often  represented  to  be.  Upon  this  point  we  have  the  full  and 
express  testimony  of  Mr.  Greeley  himself.  He  says: 

The  current  notion  that  the  Puritans  were  a  sour,  morose,  ascetic 
people — objecting,  as  Macaulay  says,  to  bear-baiting,  not  that  it  gave 


22  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

pain  to  the  bear,  but  that  it  gave  pleasure  to  the  spectator — is  not  justified 
by  my  recollections,  nor  by  the  traditions  handed  down  through  my 
mother.  The  pioneers  of  Londonderry  were  so  thoroughly  Puritan  that, 
while  their  original  framed  and  well-built  meeting-house  was  finished  and 
occupied  in  the  third  year  of  the  settlement,  when  there  were  none  other 
but  log  huts  in  the  township,  nearly  a  century  elapsed  before  any  other 
than  a  Presbyterian  or  Orthodox  Congregational  sermon  was  preached 
therein,  and  nobody  that  was  anybody  adhered  to  any  rival  church,  down 
to  a  period  within  the  memory  of  persons  still  living.  "  The  "Westminster 
8Ju>rtcr  Catechism  " — a  rather  tough  digest  of  Calvinistic  theology,  which 
aroused  my  infantile  wonder  as  to  what  a  dreadful  bore  its  longer  counter- 
part must  be — was,  within  my  experience,  regularly  administered  to  us 
youngsters  once  a  week,  as  a  portion  of  our  common-school  regimen ;  and 
we  were  required  to  affirm  that  "God  having,  out  of  his  mere  good 
pleasure,  from  all  eternity,  elected  some  to  everlasting  life,"  &c.,  &c.,  as 
though  it  were  next  of  kin  to  the  proposition  that  two  and  two  made 
four.  If  there  was  anywhere  a  community  strictly,  thoroughly  Puritan, 
such  was  Londonderry  down  to  at  least  1800,  as  she  mainly  is  to-day. 
And  yet  there  was  more  humour,  more  play,  more  fun,  more  merriment,  in 
that  Puritan  community,  than  can  be  found  anywhere  in  this  anxious, 
plodding  age.  All  were  measurably  poor,  yet  seldom  were  any  hungry; 
all  wore  coarse  clothes,  made  in  utter  contempt  of  the  fashions  which,  in 
the  course  of  three  or  four  years,  had  made  their  way  from  Paris  to 
Boston ;  yet  lads  and  lasses  were  as  comely  in  each  other's  eyes,  though 
clad  in  coarse  homespun,  as  if  they  had  been  arrayed  in  purple  and  fine 
linen,  and  redolent  of  lavender  and  patchouli;  and  they  danced  -with 
each  other  through  long  winter  nights  with  a  vigour  and  zest  rarely 
evinced  at  Almack's  or  in  Fifth  Avenue  mansions.  Their  weddings  were 
far  more  numerously  attended  and  more  expensive  than  are  the  average  in 
our  day;  for  not  to  be  invited  was  an  affront,  as  it  implied  discredit  or 
insignificance ;  and  all  who  were  invited  expected  to  eat  and  drink  bounti- 
fully of  the  best  that  could  be  had.  A  general  discharge  of  musketry 
throughout  the  neighborhood  ushered  in  a  wedding-day ;  and  the  bride- 
groom's party,  starting  from  his  house,  was  met  by  the  bride's  at  a  point 
half-way  to  hers,  when  one  of  each  party  was  chosen  to  "run  for  the 
bottle"  to  the  bride's  house;  and  whichever  won  the  race  returned  with 
the  prize  to  the  wedding  assembly;  which,  having  drunk  all  around, 
proceeded,  under  a  dropping  fire  of  musketry,  to  their  destination; 
wkere  —  the  ceremony  having  been  duly  performed  —  drinking  was 
resumed,  and  continued,  with  alternate  feasting  and  dancing,  often  till 
broad  daylight 

If  the  just  renown  which  Horace  Greeley  achieved  by  his 
intellectual  triumphs  and  his  beneficent  labours  in  behalf  of 
the  cause  of  man's  moral,  political,  and  social  advancement 
has  given  new  lustre  to  the  name  of  the  people  among  whom 


LEARNING   TO   READ.  23 

lie  was  born  and  reared,  it  should  be  remembered  that  thence 
lie  received  and  acquired  the  qualities  which  did  very  much 
to  enable  him  to  win  the  first  position  in  the  most  influential 
calling,  and  to  earn  even  in  his  lifetime  the  candid  respect  of 
all  men  whose  respect  is  worth  having. 

Horace  Greeley  was  born  in  humble  circumstances.  IL's 
father,  sometime  after  his  marriage,  had  bought  a  farm  of 
forty  acres  (afterwards  increased  to  fifty),  most  of  which  was 
situated  in  the  town  of  Amherst,  but  some  of  it  in  the  adjoin- 
ing town  of  Bedford.  It  was  on  the  old  road  from  Amoskeag 
Falls  (now  the  thriving  city  of  Manchester)  to  the  village  of 
Amherst,  and  about  five  miles  from  the  latter.  To  this  farm 
the  family  had  removed  about  three  years  before  the  birth  of 
Horace.  The  house  in  which  he  was  born  was  a  modest, 
framed,  unpainted  structure  of  one  story,  and  at  the  time 
quite  new.  "It  was  only  modified  in  our  time,"  he  long 
afterwards  says,  "by  filling  up  and  making  narrower  the  old- 
fashioned  kitchen  fireplace,  which,  having  already  devoured 
all  the  wood  on  the  farm,  yawned  ravenously  for  more."  The 
dwelling,  which  still  remains,  faces  the  road  from  the  north  on 
a  narrow  plateau,  about  two-thirds  down  a  hill,  which  was 
mostly  covered  by  an  orchard  of  natural  fruit.  In  front  was 
a  patch  of  garden  and  a  small  frog-pond.  Mr.  Greeley  always 
thought  that  sweeter  and  more  spicy  apples  grew  in  the 
neglected  orchard  of  his  birthplace  than  can  be  bought  in 
market;  and  insisted  that  it  was  not  a  mere  notion  that  most 
fruits  attain  their  highest  and  best  flavour  at  or  near  the  cold- 
est latitude  in  which  they  can  be  grown  at  all. 

Horace  was  for  some  years  a  feeble,  sickly  child,  even 
unable  to  watch  through  a  closed  window  the  falling  of  rain 
without  incurring  instant  and  violent  illness.  He  became  the 
companion  and  confident  of  his  mother  about  as  soon  as  he 
could  talk,  and  the  willing,  interested  listener  to  her  store  of 
ballad,  story,  anecdote,  and  tradition.  He  says:  "I  learned 
to  read  at  her  knee, — of  course  longer  ago  than  I  can  remem- 
ber; but  I  can  faintly  recollect  her  sitting  spinning  at  her 
'little  wheel,'  with  the  book  in  her  lap,  whence  I  was  taking 
my  daily  lesson;  and  thus  I  soon  acquired  the  facility  of 


24  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

reading  from  a  book  side  wise  or  upside  down  as  readily  as  in 
the  usual  fashion, — a  knack  which  I  did  not  at  first  suppose 
peculiar;  but  which,  being  at  length  observed,  became  a  sub- 
ject of  neighbourhood  wonder  and  fabulous  exaggeration." 
Having  so  early  learned  to  read  in  so  singular  a  manner, 
Horace  was  sent  to  public  school  two  months  before  he  was 
three  years  of  age.  In  order  that  so  little  a  boy  might  attend 
school,  he  made  his  home  for  stated  times  with  his  grandfather 
Woodburn,  the  school-house  of  his  district  being  but  fifty 
rods  from  his  house.  Hence  the  precocious  boy  lived  at  his 
grandfather's,  and  went  thence  to  school,  most  of  each  winter 
and  some  months  in  summer  from  the  time  he  was  three  till 
he  was  six  years  of  age. 

His  first  schoolmaster  was  David  Woodburn  Dickey,  dis- 
tantly related  to  himself :  a  classical  scholar,  and  an  able, 
worthy  man,  but  a  severe  governor  of  youth,  and  having  prac- 
tical faith  in  the  efficacy  of  birch  and  ferule.  It  appears  clear 
that  thus  early  in  his  life  Horace  Greeley  manifested  a  strong 
antipathy  to  harsh  punishments.  His  next  teacher  was  Cyrus 
Winn,  who  rarely  or  never  struck  a  blow,  but  governed  by 
moral  force  and  by  appeals  to  the  nobler  impulses  of  his  pupils. 
He  was  highly  successful,  and  left  at  the  close  of  his  second 
term  to  the  great  regret  of  pupils  and  parents.  His  departure 
caused  the  first  keen  sorrow  of  Horace  Greeley's  life.  He 
never  saw  his  beloved  teacher  again,  who  was  drowned  during 
the  following  winter. 

The  admirable  start  given  Horace  by  his  mother  enabled 
him  to  make  rapid  progress  in  school.  He  was  diligent,  and 
quick  to  learn.  He  was  especially  clever  in  spelling,  and  very 
soon  rose  to  the  head  of  the  first  class,  and  retained  that  posi- 
tion almost  constantly  during  the  whole  of  his  school-days. 
"  It  was  a  custom  of  the  school,"  says  Mr.  Greeley,  "  to  choose 
sides  for  a  '  spelling-match '  one  afternoon  of  each  week, — the 
head  of  the  first  class  in  spelling  and  the  pupil  standing  next 
being  the  choosers.  In  my  case,  however,  it  was  found  neces- 
sary to  change  the  rule,  and  confide  the  choice  to  those  who 
Btood  second  and  third  respectively;  as  I — a  mere  infant  of 
four  years — could  spell,  but  not  choose, — often  preferring  my 


1II&   FIRST   8C1IOOLHOUSE.  25 

playmates  who  could  not  spell  at  all.  These  spelling-matches 
•usually  took  place  in  the  evening,  when  I  could  not  keep  my 
eyes  open  and  should  have  been  in  bed.  It  was  often  neces- 
sary to  rap  me  sharply  when  '  the  word'  came  around  to  me; 
but  I  never  failed  to  respond;  and  it  came  to  be  said  that  I 
spelled  as  well  asleep  as  awake.  I  apprehend  that  this  was 
more  likely  to  be  true  of  some  others  of  the  class,  who,  if 
ever  so  sound  asleep,  could  scarcely  have  spelled  worse  than 
they  did."3 

The  present  generation  of  school-boys,  especially  in  our 
cities  and  towns,  have  little  idea  of  school-day  hardships  fifty 
years  ago.  In  nearly  every  Northern  State,  and  now  in  many 
of  the  Southern  States,  one  may  find  in  every  considerable 
town  and  city  a  public  schoolhouse,  often  many,  little  less  than 
palatial  in  size,  built  oftentimes  at  great  expense,  and  with 
every  consideration  for  the  health  and  comfort  of  the  pupils, 
and  with  all  the  "  modern  improvements  "  as  to  ventillation, 
water,  heating  apparatus,  etc.,  which  are  found  in  the  most 
celebrated  hotels,  with  the  exception,  perhaps,  of  elevators. 
Upon  these  vast  structures  many  millions  of  money  have  been 
expended,  very  much  of  which,  undoubtedly,  might  have  been 
more  wisely  laid  out  in  more  modest  buildings  of  greater 
number  and  more  attractive  architecture.  Horace  Greeley  was 
often  carried  through  the  snow  to  school  by  an  affectionate 
aunt  or  the  larger  boys.  When  reached,  the  building  was 
small,  square,  cheerless  in  situation,  and  comfortless  within. 
The  seats  were  rude  benches,  without  backs,  with  the  rudest 
possible  apologies  for  desks  along  the  sides  of  the  room  for 
those  who  might  be  engaged  in  writing  or  "  cyphering."  Such 

I 

»I  think  there  mast  be  those  who  have  a  genius  for  spelling,  just  as 
there  are  those  who  have  a  genius  for  poetry,  eloquence,  mechanics,  etc. 
I  knew  a  lad  at  school — about  as  little  and  as  young  as  Horace  Greeley 
when  he  was  the  champion  of  the  spelling-matches — who,  though  he  could 
not  at  first  spell  at  all,  and  used  to  weep  most  mournfully  over  always 
being  at  the  foot  of  the  class — suddenly  went  to  the  head,  one  day,  and 
never  afterwards  missed  a  word.  He  "put  down"  the  whole  town  at 
spelling-matches  before  he  was  five  years  old.  He  voted  for  Mr.  Greeley 
for  President,  in  1872,  and  has  been  heard  to  say  that  he  would  not 
exchange  that  fact  for  all  the  offices  in  the  United  States. 


26  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

was  the  building  in  which  lie  first  attended  school,  arid  ho 
never  went  to  any  which  was  much  better. 

But  he  progressed  rapidly  in  his  studies,  and  soon  became 
proficient  in  reading,  arithmetic,  and  grammar,  in  addition  to 
his  unequalled  proficiency  as  a  speller,  lie  always  wanted  to 
be  at  the  head  of  his  class,  and  if1  by  some  mishap  he  was 
"  turned  down,"  he  would  weep  bitterly  over  his  mistake.  He 
acquired  a  knowledge  of  geography  at  an  unusually  early  age, 
and  had  read  the  Bible  through  with  his  mother  before  he  was 
five  years  old.  He  was  a  shy  boy,  caring  little  for  boyish 
sports,  and  not  often  participating  therein,  spending  his  time 
in  reading  instead;  but  he  was  a  universal  favourite  with  his 
school -fellows,  and  generally  regarded  in  the  community  as 
a  prodigy.  He  was  an  omniverous  reader,  and  while  the  other 
boys  were  engaged  during  the  recesses  at  play,  he  would  be 
seen  lying  prone  on  the  grass,  weather  permitting,  devouring 
some  book  that  he  had  borrowed.  He  was  observed  to  be 
occupied  several  times  during  the  noon  recess,  utterly  oblivious 
of  dinner,  and  to  return  to  school,  when  the  teacher  rapped 
with  his  ferule  upon  the  window,  perfectly  unconscious  that 
he  had  done  nothing  to  satisfy  his  appetite.  He  was  a  boy 
Dominie  Sampson  —  harmless,  studious,  not  fond  of  amuse- 
ments, brave,  and  absolutely  wanting  in  the  feeling  of  cruelty. 
It  has  been  said  of  him  that  he  would  quietly  receive  the  blow 
of  a  schoolmate,  but  would  appear,  as  a  declaimer,  even  when 
a  small  boy,  before  the  whole  school  without  embarrassment; 
but  I  doubt  whether  the  New  England  boy  lived  who  would 
have  given  a  blow  in  anger  to  one  BO  innocent  as  "  Hod " 
Greeley,  as  he  was  commonly  called,  was  universally  known 
to  be.  . 

"When  the  precocious  boy  got  old  enough  to  work,  there  was 
much  work  to  do.  Farming  in  New  England  has  never  been, 
sport.  The  year  during  which  Horace  Greeley  first  worked  on 
the  farm  was  the  "cold  summer"  of  1816,  when  there  was 
an  inch  of  snow  in  June,  no  single  month  without  a  frost,  the 
corn  not  filling  till  October.  The  first  task  of  the  boy  of  five 
years  was  to  precede  his  father  in  the  hoeing  of  corn,  dig  open 
the  hills,  .and  kill  the  wire- worms  and  grubs  that  were  infesting 


KIPING    IIORSE   TO   PLOUGH.  27 

the  crop.  lie  then  began  to  "  ride  horse  to  plough,"  the  horse 
preceding  and  guiding  the  oxen.  "Occasionally,"  he  says, 
"  the  plough  would  strike  a  fast  stone,  and  bring  up  the  team 
all  standing,  pitching  me  over  the  horse's  head,  and  landing 
me  three  to  five  feet  in  front.  In  the  frosty  autumn  mornings, 
the  working  teams  had  to  be  '  baited '  on  the  rowen  or  after- 
math of  thick,  sweet  grass  beside  the  luxuriant  corn;  and  I 
was  called  out  at  sunrise  to  watch  and  keep  them  out  of  the 
corn  while  the  men  ate  their  breakfast  before  yoking  up  and 
going  afield.  My  bare  feet  imbibed  a  prejudice  against  that 
line  of  duty;  but  such  premature  rising  induced  sleepiness; 
so,  if  my  feet  had  not  ached,  the  oxen  would  have  had  a  better 
chance  for  corn."3  lie  also  did  much  in  these  early  days  in 
the  work  of  burning  charcoal — a  labour  requiring  great  watch- 
fulness and  frequent  exposure.  He  says  that  after  a  week  of 
coal-burning,  one  finds  it  hard  to  return  to  regular  sleep,  but 
will  hastily  wake  every  hour  or  so,  and  instinctively  jump  up 
"  to  see  how  the  pit  is  going  on."  The  lad  did  a  great  deal  of 
disagreeable  labour  in  removing  stones  from  the  fields  of  his 
father's  rocky  farm.  "  Pick  as  closely  as  you  may,"  he  says, 
"  the  next  ploughing  turns  up  a  fresh  eruption  of  boulders  and 
pebbles,  from  the  size  of  a  hickory-nut  to  that  of  a  tea-kettle; 
and  as  the  work  is  mainly  to  be  done  in  March  or  April,  when 
the  earth  is  saturated  with  ice-cold  water,  if  not  also  whitened 
with  falling  snow,  youngsters  soon  learn  to  regard  it  with 
detestation.  I  filially  love  the  '  Granite  State,'  but  could  well 
excuse  the  absence  of  sundry  subdivisions  of  her  granite." 
Fifty  years  after  his  hard  work,  as  a  mere  boy,  in  the  cornfields, 
burning  charcoal,  and  picking  stones,  Mr.  Greeley  recurs  to 
the  season  of  "  hop-picking  "  as  the  rural  carnival,  the  festive 
harvest-home  of  those  old  times ;  answering  to  the  vintage  of 
southern  France  or  Italy. 

During  the  fifth  and  sixth  Bummers  of  Horace  Greeley's 
life,  he  attended  school  irregularly,  having  to  go  about  a  mile 
from  home.  Often  called  out  of  bed  at  dawn  to  "  ride  horse 
to  plough,"  he  would  be  thus  engaged  until  nine  or  ten  o'clock 

•Recollections,  p.  38. 


28  TJFE   OF   HORACE   GREELET. 

in  the  morning,  when  lie  would  trudge  off  to  school,  some- 
times arriving  when  the  morning's  session  was  half  through. 
In  the  winter  there  was  less  work,  but  the  snows  were  deep, 
the  cold  intense,  the  north  wind  piercing.  Nevertheless,  the 
white-headed  urchin,  though  thinly  clad,  somehow  found  his 
way  to  school  promptly  nearly  every  day  during  the  winter 
terms,  and  continued  to  progress  in  his  studies  no  less  rapidly 
than  when  he  was  the  youngest  and  smallest  of  the  pupils. 

During  the  years  1818,  1819,  the  family  lived  on  what  was 
called  the  "  Beard  Farm,"  in  the  town  of  Bedford,  but  returned 
to  the  old  homestead  in  the  spring  of  the  following  year,  which 
was  one  of  intensely  hard  and  constant  labour  to  father,  wife, 
and  children — so  that  neither  Horace  nor  his  brother  could  go 
to  school  —  and  sadly  ended  with  the  utter  bankruptcy  of 
Zaccheus  Greeley.  The  year  closed  with  the  termination  of 
his  living  in  the  old  Granite  State  and  the  total  wreck  of  his 
small  fortune. 

The  particulars  of  this  sad  mishap  we  shall  relate  in  the 
following  chapter.  Here  it  will  be  in  order  to  make  a  brief 
r/*WT/i/  of  Horace  Greeley's  life  in  his  native  State. 

We  have  seen  that  up  to  the  time  when  he  was  about  ten 
years  of  age,  the  boy  Horace  Greeley  had  done  his  fair  share 
of  hard  labour,  and  had  studied  more,  and  far  more  success- 
fully, than  is  usual.  When  but  five  years  old,  he  had  read  the 
Bible  through  in  course,  from  Genesis  to  Revelations.  At  ten, 
he  had  mastered  all  the  school  books  of  the  times.  He  had 
also  read  all  the  books  he  could  borrow  in  the  neighbourhood 
for  miles  around.  The  first  book  he  ever  owned  was  the 
"  Columbian  Orator,"  a  volume  consisting  of  selections  of 
prose  and  poetry  for  recitation  and  declamation.  Many  school- 
boys of  the  West  whose  school  daj's  were  years  later  than  those 
of  Horace  Greeley,  will  well  recollect  the  same  book.  It  did 
not,  in  fact,  pass  out  of  use  in  some  of  the  Western  States 
until  after  Horace  Greeley's  name  was  well  known  throughout 
the  country,  and  The  New- York  Tribune  had  become  a  power 
in  the  land.  When  he  was  seven  or  eight  years  old,  he  had 
committed  to  memory  every  selection  in  this  book,  but  when 


A   BORN   DEMOCRAT.  29 

he  was  less  than  three  years  old,  and  before  he  could  speak 
plainly,  he  declaimed  the  verses  beginning, 

"  You  'cl  scarce  expect  one  of  my  age 
To  speak  in  public  on  the  stage," 

so  often  that  he  became  heartily  sick  of  the  lines,  and  never 
again  became  reconciled  to  them  during  his  whole  life.  Very 
early  in  life  he  was  also  able  to  repeat  from  memory  whole 
books  of  both  the  Old  and  the  New  Testament. 

It  is  related  of  him  that  in  order  that  he  might  pursue  his 
studies  by  night,  he  would  gather  large  numbers  of  pine-knots, 
by  the  light  of  which  in  the  fire-place,  as  he  lay  prone  on  the 
floor,  he  would  read  for  hours  —  until  actually  driven  to  bed, 
in  fact  —  utterly  oblivious  of  what  might  be  going  on  about 
him.  After  going  to  bed  he  would  keep  his  brother  awake  for 
a  good  long  hour  with  accounts  of  all  the  matters  and  things 
he  had  been  reading  about. 

The  only  sport,  perhaps,  in  which  he  took  any  real  delight 
during  these  early  years  in  New  Hampshire,  was  fishing,  and 
in  this  he  was  more  expert  than  any  of  the  boys  of  the  neigh- 
bourhood. And  even  fishing  was  rather  work  than  sport  to 
him.  "When  I  go  a-fishing,"  he  used  to  say,  "I  go  a-fishing, 
and  not  funning."  He  was  almost  always  unusually  success- 
ful, catching  more  fishes  than  all  his  companions  together. 

The  years  Horace  G-reeley  lived  in  New  Hampshire  were 
passed  in  a  community  of  democrats.  In  Amherst,  Bedford, 
and  Londonderry  there  was  no  caste  of  any  kind  in  those  days. 
Perhaps  the  most  notable  illustration  of  the  difference  between 
plain  and  "company"  days,  was  that,  on  great  occasions, 
guests  expected  to  be  treated  to  wheaten  bread,  whereas  the 
usual  staff  of  life  was  bread  made  of  cornmeal  or  rye  flour. 
The  absence  of  all  social  distinctions  is  shown  by  the  fact, 
related  by  Mr.  Greeley  years  afterwards,  that  when  for  a  single 
year  his  New  Hampshire  home  echoed  to  the  steps  of  a  female 
"help,"  she  always  ate  with  the  family,  even  when  they  had  the 
neighbours  as  "company,"  and  she  had  her  party,  and  invited 
the  girls  of  the  neighbourhood  to  be  her  guests  at  tea,  just  as 
though  she  were  a  daughter  of  the  house.  The  richest  man 


SO  LITE  OF  HORACE  GREELEY. 

in  the  whole  neighbourhood  was  not  worth  more  than  $3,000. 
Hospitality  had  become  less  bounteous,  Mr.  Greelej  asserts, 
and  kinship  less  prized,  than  in  the  days  of  the  Scotch-Irieh 
pioneers;  but  there  was  still  much  visiting  of  relatives  and 
social  enjoyment,  especially  in  winter,  when  hundreds  returned 
to  the  old  Londonderry  hive  from  the  younger  swarms  scat- 
tered all  over  the  East;  not  a  few  from  as  far  away  as  Western 
New  York.  Zaccheus  Greeley's  latch-string  was  always  out; 
"  and  a  free  liver,"  his  distinguished  son  remarks  with  char- 
acteristic drollery,  "with  twelve  brothers  and  sisters,  to  say 
nothing  of  their  partners  by  marriage  and  their  children,  is 
not  apt  to  be  persistently  shunned."  The  father  of  Horace 
Greeley  was  as  proud  as  he  was  poor,  and  as  generous  as  he 
was  proud.  The  social  requirements  of  the  times  and  neigh- 
bourhood, perfectly  unexclusive,  democratic  as  they  were, 
surpassed  his  means  to  afford.  And  now  debts  began  to  press 
upon  him  with  greater  and  greater  burden;  until,  in  1820,  he 
reached  the  zero  point  of  personal  finances  and  credit,  and 
was  forced  to  witness  the  sad  spectacle  of  his  wife  and  little 
ones  being  sold  out  of  house  and  home  that  his  lawful  obliga- 
tions to  pay  might  be  satisfied,  in  the  customary  mode  of 
sacrifice  according  to  the  forms  of  law. 


CHATTER    II 

APPRENTICESHIP 

Removal  of  the  Ruined  Family  to  Vermont  —  Poverty  of  the  Manly 
American  Sort  —  Vermont  Schools  —  Horace  Keeps  a  Sort  of  Night 
School  —  An  Omnivorous  Reader  —  "Clearing"  Timber  Lands  —  Flea 
Knoll  —  The  Ague  —  A  Respected  Poor  Family  —  Review  of  Farmer- 
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ing a  Trade  Better  than  a  College  Education. 

THE  family  catastrophe  referred  to  at  the  close  of  the  last 
chapter  was  the  result  of  a  variety  of  causes.  Zaccheus  Gree- 
ley's  two  years  tenancy  of  the  "Beard  Farm"  was  disastrous 
in  more  ways  than  one.  He  was  not  paid,  as  he  expected  to 
be,  for  the  improvements  he  made  on  the  farm.  His  health 
failed,  and  for  nearly  a  year  he  was  unable  to  work.  His 
brother,  who  had  taken  his  own  farm,  did  not  prosper.  It 
was  a  period  of  "hard  times,"  that  is,  a  period  when>almost 
all  persons  in  community  belong  to  the  debtor  class.  lie  had 
added  to  his  own  indebtedness  by  rash  indorsements,  so  that 
he  owed  about  $1,000,  which  all  he  had  would  not  have  paid 
at  the  prices  then  current.  The  sad  story  of  the  complete 
downfall  of  the  humble  household  can  never  be  better  told 
than  in  the  words  of  the  Great  Editor  himself: 

We  had  finished  our  summer  tillage  and  our  haying,  when  a  very  heavy 
rain  set  in,  near  the  end  of  August.  I  think  its  second  day  was  a  Satur- 
day; and  still  the  rain  poured  till  far  into  the  night.  Father  was  absent 
on  business;  but  our  mother  gathered  her  little  ones  around  her,  and 
delighted  us  with  stories  and  prospects  of  good  things  she  purposed  to 
do  for  ua  in  the  better  days  she  hoped  to  see.  Father  did  not  return 


32  LIFE   OF  HORACE   GREELEY. 

till  after  we  children  were  fast  asleep;  and,  when  he  did,  it  was  with 
tidings  that  our  ill  fortune  was  about  to  culminate.  I  guess  that  he  was 
scarcely  surprised,  though  we  young  ones  ruefully  were,  when,  about  sun- 
rise  on  Monday  morning,  the  sheriff  and  sundry  other  officials,  with  two 
or  three  of  our  principal  creditors,  appeared,  and — first  formally  demand* 
ing  payment  of  their  claims — proceeded  to  levy  on  farm,  stock,  imple- 
ments, household  stuff,  and  nearly  all  our  worldly  possessions  but  the 
clothes  we  stood  in.  There  had  been  no  writ  issued  till  then,  —  of  course, 
no  trial,  no  judgment,  —  but  it  was  a  word  and  a  blow  in  those  days,  and 
the  blow  first,  in  the  matter  of  debt-collecting  by  legal  process.  Father 
left  the  premises  directly,  apprehending  arrest  and  imprisonment,  and 
was  invisible  all  day ;  the  rest  of  us  repaired  to  a  friendly  neighbour's, 
and  the  work  of  levying  went  on  in  our  absence.  It  were  needless  to  add 
that  all  we  had  was  swallowed  up,  and  our  debts  not  much  lessened. 
Our  farm,  which  had  cost  us  $1,350,  and  which  had  been  considerably 
improved  in  our  hands,  was  appraised  and  set  off  to  creditors  at  $500, 
out  of  which  the  legal  costs  were  first  deducted.  A  barn-full  of  rye, 
grown  by  us  on  another's  land,  whereof  we  owned  an  undivided  half, 
was  attached  by  a  doctor,  threshed  out  by  his  poorer  customers  by  days' 
work  on  account,  and  sold ;  the  net  result  being  an  enlargement  of  our 
debt,  —  the  grain  failing  to  meet  all  the  cost.  Thus,  when  night  fell,  we 
•were  as  bankrupt  a  family  as  well  could  be. 

We  returned  to  our  devastated  house ;  and  the  rest  of  us  stayed  there 
while  father  took  a  journey  on  foot  westward,  in  quest  of  a  new  home. 
He  stopped  in  the  township  of  Hampton,  Washington  County,  N.  Y.,  and 
worked  there  two  or  three  months  with  a  Colonel  Parker  French,  who 
tilled  a  noble  farm,  and  kept  tavern  on  the  main  road  from  Troy  into 
western  Vermont.  He  returned  to  us  in  due  time,  and,  on  the  1st  of  Jan- 
uary, 1821,  we  all  started  in  a  hired  two-horse  sleigh,  with  the  liltle 
worldly  gear  that  was  left  us,  for  the  township  of  Westhaven,  Vermont, 
where  father  had  hired,  for  $1G  per  annum,  a  small  house,  in  which,  after 
an  intensely  cold  journey,  we  were  installed  three  days  later.1 

The  family  of  Zaccheus  Greeley  had  now  made  the  acquain- 
tance of  genuine  poverty,  —  "not  beggary,  nor  dependence, 
but  the  manly  American  sort."  The  value  of  their  whole 
property,  including  even  the  clothes  they  wore,  did  not  exceed 
$200 ;  and  as  that  sum  had  afterwards  to  be  paid  on  old  New 
Hampshire  debts,  their  material  possessions  when  they  reached 
their  new  home  were  correctly  represented  by  0,  with  a  credit 
for  their  few  worldly  goods  in  possession.  "Yet,"  says  Mr. 
Greeley,  in  his  Recollections  of  this  period  of  his  busy  life, 
"we  never  needed  nor  ran  into  debt  for  anything;  never  were 

1  Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life,  49-50. 


"THE  RUDIMENTS  OF  LEARNING."  33 

without  meal,  meat,  and  wood,  and  very  rarely  without 
money."  The  father  went  to  chopping  at  fifty  cents  per  day, 
and  the  children  all  attended  school  till  spring,  and  this 
though  there  were  no  school-funds  in  those  days,  "  and  rate- 
bills  for  four  children  made  quite  a  hole  in  a  gross  income  of 
$3  per  week."  The  schools  are  spoken  of  as  at  this  time 
rather  better  than  those  of  New  Hampshire  at  least  on  account 
of  the  longer  duration  of  the  terms.  On  account  of  the  nar- 
row range  of  studies,  however,  young  Greeley  was  unable  to 
make  that  considerable  advance  in  knowledge  which  a  more 
liberal  curriculum  would  have  provided  for.  And  here,  it 
may  be  said,  in  passing,  is  an  argument  in  favour  of  a  generous 
system  of  instruction  in  our  public  schools  that  they  might 
well  heed  who  insist  that  the  state  has  done  its  whole  duty  in 
the  premises  when  it  has  provided  for  all  the  means  of 
acquiring  "  the  rudiments  of  an  English  education,"  whatever 
they  may  be.  Whilst  many  are  acquiring  those  "  rudiments," 
others  —  and  these  the  best  and  brightest  of  our  youth  —  are 
able  to  acquire  the  rudiments  and  much  more  besides.  Why 
should  these  be  kept  hum-drumming  the  rudiments  over  and 
over  again  because  of  stupidity  for  which  they  are  no  wise 
responsible?  Those  who  can  only  mark  time  have  no  right  to 
keep  in  the  ranks  those  who  can  march.  It  does  not  cost  a 
penny  more  to  the  state  to  keep  a  boy  at  school  during  the 
school-going  years  who  in  that  period  can  gain  what  is  called 
"a  good  English  education"  and  also  no  little  knowledge  of 
practical  sciences,  history,  literature,  than  it  does  to  keep  a 
boy  at  school  for  the  same  period  who  will  emerge  at  the  end 
of  it  utterly  befogged  in  the  mists  of  vulgar  fractions,  and 
unable  to  "  move  on."  There  is  neither  reason  nor  economy 
in  manacling  bright  heads  to  blockheads. 

Horace  Greeley  lived  in  Vermont  with  his  father  from 
January,  1821,  up  to  the  latter  part  of  April,  1826,  that  is, 
from  the  time  he  was  about  ten  years  old  until  he  was  some- 
tiling  over  fifteen.  This  is,  perhaps,  the  period  of  life  when 
one's  mind,  as  well  as  body,  grows  the  most  rapidly.  It  surely 
may  be  said  to  be  the  beginning  of  the  period  in  which  mental 
development  is,  on  the  average,  the  greatest.  But  so  far  as 
3 


34  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

the  schools  in  this  part  of  Vermont  were  concerned,  there  might 
about  as  well  have  been  none  for  any  substantial  good  they 
did  Horace  Greeley.  Indeed,  one  of  the  teachers  went  to 
Zaccheus  Greeley  and  frankly  confessed  Horace  might  well 
be  his  teacher,  but  he  could  not  teach  Horace  anything.  IIo 
had  all  the  school  books  of  the  time  by  heart,  being  as  familiar 
with  every  one  as  with  the  alphabet.  Nevertheless,  he  con- 
tinued to  attend  during  the  winter  terms,  but  doubtless  received 
far  more  benefit  as  a  teacher  than  as  a  pupil.  For  the  boys  of 
neighbours  would  come  to  him  of  nights  and  get  him  to  clear 
away  the  dark  places  of  grammar  for  them,  and  show  them 
how  to  "  work  out "  sums  in  the  arithmetic.  He  had  a  remark- 
able faculty  of  clearly  and  forcibly  illustrating  the  lessons  in 
hand. 

He  continued  to  be  a  great  reader.  When  about  eleven 
years  of  age,  he  read  Shakespeare,  and  not  long  afterwards 
procured  a  volume  of  poems  by  Mrs.  Hemans  for  whom  he 
conceived  the  greatest  admiration,  which  did  not  abate  during 
his  life.  He  had  some  time  before  read  the  Arabian  Nights, 
and  Robinson  Crusoe.  As  in  New  Hampshire,  so  when  living 
in  Vermont,  he  scoured  the  neighbourhood  for  books;  read  a 
number  of  historical  works,  considerable  English  poetry, 
romances,  and,  in  short,  whatever  in  the  shape  of  a  book  he 
could  buy  or  borrow.  Thus  he  educated  himself;  thus  the 
process  of  becoming  a  self-made  man  went  on  rapidly  and 
well,  notwithstanding  difficulties  and  trials  before  which  an 
ordinary  mind  and  a  nature  of  less  than  sublime  pluck,  would 
have  succumbed  in  utter  despair. 

For  these  five  years  of  farmer-boy  life  in  Vermont  were 
not  only  years  of  poverty  —  of  the  manly  American  sort 
aforesaid  —  but  of  hard  labour.  In  New  Hampshire,  the 
Greeleys  ranked  as  farmers ;  in  Vermont  they  were  day- 
labourers.  The  cot  rented  by  the  father  was  on  an  extensive 
farm  known  as  "  the  Minot  Estate,"  and  the  first  contract 
for  work  he  made  was  one  in  which  he  engaged  to  "  clear " 
fifty  acres  of  white  pine  lands.  The  price  agreed  upon  was 
seven  dollars  per  acre,  with  the  use  of  a  team,  and  half  of  tho 
fuel  and  timber  suitable  for  use.  The  work  was  rugged  and 


A   FARMER-BOY.  35 

grimy,  but  healthful.  It  required  two  years  —  except  the 
winters  —  to  finish  the  job,  and,  when  done,  part  of  the  three 
hundred  and  fifty  dollars  —  the  cash  price  of  the  labour  of 
father  and  two  sons  for  two  years — was  lost,  on  account  of  the 
bankruptcy  of  the  owner  of  the  land.  At  the  end  of  this  work, 
the  family  moved  two  miles  westward,  to  a  little  farm  known 
as  Flea  Knoll,  where  the  father  tended  a  saw  mill, —  twelve 
hours  on  and  twelve  oft', —  in  which  he  was  assisted  by  a  son 
younger  than  Horace,  the  latter  appearing  to  have  had  a 
natural  antipathy  to  log-rolling  of  any  species.  He  cultivated 
Flea  Knoll.  But  the  first  part  of  the  season  was  wet,  and  the 
crops  had  to  be  planted  in  mortar.  Then  it  became  very  hot 
and  dryr  so  that  the  surface  of  the  ground  was  baked  into  a 
tough  crust,  through  which  the  plants  could  not  penetrate 
without  great  assistance  from  the  hoe.  The  results  were  very 
meagre.  Next,  the  family  took  the  fever  and  ague,  and  were 
glad  to  return  at  the  end  of  a  year  to  the  Minot  estate.  Here 
they  cultivated  a  small  farm  during  the  next  two  years,  and 
also  did  some  more  work  at  "  clearing."  The  crops  of  these 
two  years  were  in  the  main  a  failure,  the  wheat  being  destroyed 
by  the  midge. 

Thus  the  Greeleys  had  again  become  farmers.  The  expe- 
rience in  New  Hampshire  had  not  been  without  its  value  upon 
the  father.  By  hard  work,  the  most  careful  economy,  he  had 
been  able  during  these  five  years  in  Yermont  to  improve  some- 
what his  circumstances,  and  to  save  a  little  money.  It  is  not 
too  much  to  say,  perhaps,  that  no  intelligent  family  in  all  the 
republic  lived  more  humbly;  not  one  with  greater  affection 
and  happiness  among  its  members.  Their  food  was  of  the 
plainest,  and  served  in  almost  primitive  manner.  Their 
clothing,  in  summer,  was  made  of  domestic  "tow  linen";  in 
winter,  of  home-spun,  in  wThich  there  was  some  admixture  of 
wool.  Horace  Greeley's  toilet  during  these  toilsome  years 
consisted  of  a  pair  of  pantaloons,  a  shirt,  and  a  hat-,  to  which 
were  added,  for  use  in  winter,  a  waistcoat,  shoes  and  stockings. 
It  was  remarked  that  his  pantaloons  were  always  short  in  the 
legs,  and  inevitably  shorter  in  one  than  the  other.  Going 
bare-footed  all  summer, — from  very  early  spring  till  very  late 


36  LIFE  OF  HORACE   GREELEY. 

fall,  in  fact, — it  may  well  be  concluded  that  lie  imbibed  a 
hearty  detestation  of  the  Canada  thistles  which  did  greatly 
abound  in  the  country.  The  statement  should  not  be  omitted, 
that  notwithstanding  Zaccheus  Greeley's  poverty  and  life  of 
constant  labour,  there  was  no  household  more  popular  in  the 
neighbourhood  than  his.  lie  was  himself  generous,  good- 
natured,  not  slow  at  story-telling.  Ilia  wife  was  ever  joyful, 
abounding  in  song  and  love  of  her  kind.  Horace  was  a  young 
philosopher,  awkward  in  manner,  unique  in  apparel,  but  droll 
in  conversation,  and  ever  ready  to  assist  his  schoolmates  it 
their  studies.  No  poor  family  ever  received  more  company, 
and  few  rich  ones  ever  had  more  genuine  friends. 

During  his  life  in  Westhaven,  Jlorace  Greeley  learned  to 
take  part  in  two  kinds  of  sport  —  snow-balling  and  bee-hunt- 
ing—  and  became  quite  successful  in  either.  It  was  observed, 
however,  that  the  most  of  his  share  of  the  luscious  contents 
of  the  bee-tree,  was  invariably  carried  to  the  store  and  sold. 
He  also  made  some  money  for  himself  by  grubbing  up  the 
roots  of  pitch-pine  trees  and  selling  them  for  kindlings.  The 
funds  thus  procured  he  invested  in  books. 

He  had  now  been  a  hard-working  farmer-boy  for  ten  years. 
Reviewing  this  portion  of  his  life,  he  says:  "During  the 
whole  period,  though  an  eager  and  omniverous  reader,  I  never 
saw  a  book  that  treated  of  agriculture  and  the  natural  sciences 
auxiliary  thereto.  I  think  I  never  saw  even  one  copy  of  a 
periodical  devoted  mainly  to  fanning;  and  I  doubt  that  we 
ever  harvested  one  bounteous  crop.  A  good  field  of  rye, 
corn,  or  grass,  or  potatoes,  we  sometimes  had;  but  we  ha 
more  half  crops  than  whole  ones;  and  a  good  yield  of  an^ 
one  product  was  generally  balanced  by  two  or  three  poor  ones. 
I  know  I  had  the  stuff  in  me  for  an  efficient  and  successful 
farmer;  but  such  training  as  I  received  at  home  would  never 
have  brought  it  out.  And  the  moral  I  would  deduce  from  my 
experience  is  simply  this :  Our  farmers'  sons  escape  fron, 
their  fathers'  calling  whenever  they  can,  because  it  is  made  J 
mindless,  monotonous  drudgery,  instead  of  an  ennobling, 
liberalizing,  intellectual  pursuit.  Could  I  have  known  in 
my  youth  what  a  business  farming  sometimes  is,  always  may 


A   SOKROWFUL   WALK.  37 

be,  and  yet  generally  shall  be,  I  never  would  have  sought  nor 
chosen  any  other.  In  the  farmer's  calling,  as  I  saw  it  fol- 
lower], there  was  neither  scope  for  expanding  faculties,  incite- 
ment to  constant  growth  in  knowledge,  nor  a  spur  to  generous 
ambition.  To  preserve  existence  was  its  ordinary  impulse;  to 
get  rich,  its  exceptional  and  most  exalted  aim.  So  I  turned 
from  it  in  dissatisfaction,  if  not  in  disgust,  and  sought  a 
different  sphere  and  vocation." 

The  vocation  chosen  was  that  of  a  printer,  to  which  he  had 
been  inclined  since  early  childhood.  Visiting  a  blacksmith's 
shop  once,  when  very  young,  he  was  asked  if  he  would  not 
like  to  be  a  blacksmith.  "  No,"  said  he,  "  I'm  going  to  be  a 
printer."  During  the  last  summer  that  the  family  lived  in 
New  Hampshire,  an  offer  was  made  by  the  leading  men  of  the 
neighbourhood  to  send  the  boy  to  Phillips'  Academy  at 
Exeter,  and  thence  to  college,  —  the  expense  being  so  defrayed 
that  no  part  of  it  should  fall  on  his  parents.  They  listened 
thoughtfully  to  the  proposal,  consulted  the  party  chiefly  con- 
cerned, and  then  gratefully  declined  it;  saying  they  would 
give  their  children  the  best  education  they  could  afford  and 
there  stop.  The  boy  preferred  to  oe  a  printer,  and  to  be 
indebted  for  his  schooling  to  none  but  those  of  whom  he  had 
a  right  to  ask  and  expect  it.  In  the  course  of  his  "  omnivor- 
ous reading,"  even  when  a  child,  he  found  nothing  that  gave 
him  more  delight,  or,  perhaps,  more  instruction,  than  the 
Farmer's  Cabinet,  a  weekly  journal  published  at  the  village  of 
Amherst,  and  to  which  his  father  was  a  regular  subscriber. 
In  Yermont,  he  read  with  equal  zest  the  Northern  Spectator, 
published  at  East  Poultney.  Only  a  year  after  the  family 
moved  to  Vermont,  and  when  he  was  but  eleven  years  old,  he 
went  with  his  father  to  the  newspaper  office  at  Whitehall, 
where  an  apprentice  was  wanted,  and  applied  for  the  place, 
but  had  his  application  rejected  on  account  of  his  youth.  So 
he  went  home  downcast  and  sorrowful. 

No  other  opportunity  came  under  his  observation  until  the 
spring  of  1826,  when  he  read  an  advertisement  in  the  North- 
ern Spectator,  mentioned  above,  stating  that  an  apprentice 
was  wanted  in  that  office.  So  lie  walked  to  East  Poultney, 


88  LEFE   OF   HORACE  GREELET. 

twelve  miles  distant,  to  eee  if  lie  could  secure  the  situation. 
Mr.  Parton,  in  his  Life  of  Horace  Greeley,3  thus  graphically 
describes  the  interviews  leading  to  the  contract  of  appren^ 
ticeship : 

It  was  a  fine  spring  morning  in  the  year  1826,  about  ten  o'clock,  when 
Mr.  Amos  Bliss,  the  manager,  and  one  of  the  proprietors,  of  the  Northern 
Spectator,  "might  have  been  seen"  in  the  garden  behind  his  house  plant- 
ing potatoes.  He  heard  the  gate  open  behind  him,  and,  without  turning 
or  looking  round,  became  dimly  conscious  of  the  presence  of  a  boy.  But 
the  boys  of  country  villages  go  into  whosesoever  garden  their  wandering 
fancy  impels  them,  and  supposing  this  boy  to  be  one  of  his  own  neighbours, 
Mr.  Bliss  continued  his  work  and  quickly  forgot  that  he  was  not  alone. 
In  a  few  minutes,  he  heard  a  voice  close  behind  him,  a  strange  voice, 
high-pitched  and  whining. 

It  said,  "  Are  you  the  man  that  carries  on  the  printing  office  ?" 

Mr.  Bliss  then  turned,  and  resting  upon  his  hoe,  surveyed  the  person 
•who  had  thus  addressed  him.  He  saw  standing  before  him  a  boy 
apparently  about  fifteen  years  of  age,  of  a  light,  tall,  and  slender  form, 
dressed  in  the  plain  farmer's  cloth  of  the  time,  his  garments  cut  with  an 
utter  disregard  of  elegance  and  fit.  His  trowsers  were  exceedingly  short 
and  voluminous;  he  wore  no  stockings;  his  shoes  were  of  the  kind 
denominated  "high-lows,"  and  much  worn  down;  his  hat  was  of  felt, 
"  one  of  the  old  stamp,  with  sc  small  a  brim,  that  it  looked  more  like  a  two- 
quart  measure  inverted  than  anything  else ;"  and  it  was  worn  far  back  on 
his  head;  his  hair  was  white,  with  a  tinge  of  orange  at  its  extremities,  and 
it  lay  thinly  upon  a  broad  forehead  and  over  a  head  "  rocking  on  shoulders 
which  seemed  too  slender  to  support  the  weight  of  a  member  so  dispropor- 
tioned  to  the  general  outline."  The  general  effect  of  the  figure  and  its 
costume  was  so  outrS,  they  presented  such  a  combination  of  the  rustic  and 
ludicrous,  and  the  apparition  had  come  upon  him  so  suddenly,  that  the 
amiable  gardener  could  scarcely  keep  from  laughing. 

He  restrained  himself,  however,  and  replied,  "  Yes,  I'm  the  man." 

Whereupon  the  stranger  asked,  "  Don't  you  want  a  boy  to  learn  the 
trade?" 

"Well,"  said  Mr.  Bliss,  "we  have  been  thinking  of  it.  Do  you  want  to 
learn  to  print  ?" 

"  I've  had  some  notion  of  it,"  said  the  boy  in  true  Yankee  fashion,  as 
though  he  had  not  been  dreaming  about  it,  and  longing  for  it  for  years. 

Mr.  Bliss  was  both  astonished  and  puzzled  —  astonished  that  such  a 
fellow  as  the  boy  looked  to  be,  should  have  ever  thought  of  learning  to 
print,  and  puzzled  how  to  convey  to  him  an  idea  of  the  absurdity  of  the 
notion.  So,  with  an  expression  in  his  countenance,  such  as  that  of  a 
tender-hearted  dry-goods  merchant  might  be  supposed  to  assume  if  a  hod- 

1  Page  49,  et  teg.,  new  edition. 


TALK   WITH   MR.    AMOS   BLISS.  39 

carrier  should  apply  for  a  place  in  the  lace  department,  he  said,  "Well, 
my  boy  —  but,  you  know,  it  takes  considerable  learning  to  bo  a  printer. 
Have  you  been  to  school  much  V" 

"  No,"  said  the  boy,  "  I  haven't  had  much  chance  at  school.  I've  read 
some." 

"What  have  you  read?"  asked  Mr.  Bliss. 

"  Well,  I've  read  some  history,  and  some  travels,  and  a  little  of  most 
everything." 

"  Where  do  you  live  ?" 

"  At  Westhaven." 

"  How  did  you  come  over?" 

"  I  carne  on  foot." 

"  What's  your  name  ?" 

"  Horace  Greeley." 

Now  it  happened  that  Mr.  Amos  Bliss  had  been  for  the  last  three  years 
an  Inspector  of  Common  Schools,  and  in  fulfilling  the  duties  of  his 
office  —  examining  and  licensing  teachers  —  he  had  acquired  an  uncom- 
mon facility  in  asking  questions,  and  a  fondness  for  that  exercise  which 
men  generally  entertain  for  any  employment  in  which  they  suppose 
themselves  to  excel.  The  youth  before  him  was  —  in  the  language  of 
medical  students  —  a  "fresh  subject,"  and  the  Inspector  proceeded  to  try 
all  his  skill  upon  him,  advancing  from  easy  questions  to  hard  ones,  up  to 
those  knotty  problems  with  which  he  had  been  wont  to  "  stump ' 
candidates  for  the  office  of  teacher.  The  boy  was  a  match  for  him.  He 
answered  every  question  promptly,  clearly,  and  modestly.  He  could  not 
be  "  stumped  "  in  the  ordinary  school  studies,  and  of  the  books  he  had 
read  he  could  give  a  correct  and  complete  analysis.  In  Mr.  Bliss's  own 
account  of  the  interview,  he  says,  "  On  entering  into  conversation,  and  a 
partial  examination  of  the  qualifications  of  my  new  applicant,  it  required 
but  little  time  to  discover  that  he  possessed  a  mind  of  no  common  order, 
and  an  acquired  intelligence  far  beyond  his  years.  He  had  had  but  little 
opportunity  at  the  common  school,  but  he  said  '  he  had  read  some,'  and 
what  he  had  read  he  well  understood  and  remembered.  In  addition  to 
the  ripe  intelligence  manifested  in  one  so  young,  and  whose  instruction 
had  been  so  limited,  there  was  a  single-mindedness,  a  truthfulness,  and 
common  sense  in  what  he  said,  that  at  once  commanded  my  regard." 

After  half  an  hour's  conversation  with  the  boy,  Mr.  Bliss  intimated  that 
he  thought  he  would  do,  and  told  him  to  go  into  the  printing-office  and 
talk  to  the  foreman.  Horace  went  to  the  printing-office,  and  there  his 
appearance  produced  an  effect  on  the  tender  minds  of  the  three  apprentices 
who  were  at  work  therein,  which  can  be  much  better  imagined  than 
described,  and  which  is  most  vividly  remembered  by  the  two  who  survive. 
To  the  foreman  Horace  addressed  himself,  regardless  certainly,  oblivious 
probably,  of  the  stare  and  the  remarks  of  the  boys.  The  foreman,  at  first, 
was  inclined  to  wonder  that  Mr.  Bliss  should,  for  one  moment,  think  it 
possible  that  a  boy  got  up  in  that  style  could  perform  the  most  ordinary 
duties  of  a  printer's  apprentice.  Ten  minutes'  talk  with  him,  however, 


40  LIFE  OF   IIORACE   GKEEL1Y, 

effected  a  partial  revolution  in  his  mind  in  the  boy's  favour,  and  as  he  was 
greatly  in  want  of  another  apprentice,  he  was  not  inclined  to  be  over 
particular.  He  tore  off  a  slip  of  proof-paper,  wrote  a  few  words  upon  it 
hastily  with  a  pencil,  and  told  the  boy  to  take  it  to  Mr.  Bliss.  That  piece 
of  paper  was  his  fate.  The  words  were:  "Guess  we'd  better  try  him." 
Away  went  Horace  to  the  garden,  and  presented  his  paper.  Mr.  Bliss, 
whose  curiosity  had  been  excited  to  a  high  pitch  by  the  extraordinary 
contrast  between  the  appearance  of  the  boy  and  his  real  quality,  now 
entered  into  a  long  conversation  with  him,  questioned  him  respecting  his 
history,  his  past  employment,  his  parents,  their  circumstances,  his  own 
intentions  and  wishes ;  and  the  longer  he  talked,  the  more  his  admiration 
grew.  The  result  was,  that  he  agreed  to  accept  Horace  as  an  apprentice, 
provided  his  father  would  agree  to  the  usual  terms ;  and  then,  with  eager 
steps,  and  a  light  heart,  the  happy  boy  took  the  dusty  road  that  led  to  his 
home  in  Westhaven. 

"You  're  not  going  to  hire  that  tow-head,  Mr.  Bliss,  are  you?"  asked  one 
of  the  apprentices  at  the  close  of  the  day.  "  I  am,"  was  the  reply,  "  and 
if  you  boys  are  expecting  to  get  any  fun  out  of  him,  yoj  'd  better  get  it 
quick,  or  you  '11  be  too  late.  There  's  something  in  that  tow-head,  as 
you  '11  find  out  before  you're  a  week  older." 

A  day  or  two  after,  Horace  packed  up  his  wardrobe  in  a  small  cotton 
handkerchief.  Small  as  it  was,  it  would  have  held  more;  for  its  proprietor 
never  had  more  than  two  shirts,  and  one  change  of  outer-clothing,  at  the 
same  time,  till  he  was  of  age.  Father  and  son  walked,  side  by  side,  to 
Poultney,  the  boy  carrying  his  possessions  upon  a  stick  over  his  shoulder. 

At  Poultney,  an  unexpected  difficulty  arose,  which  for  a  time  made 
Horace  tremble  in  his  high-low  shoes.  The  terms  proposed  by  Mr.  Bliss 
were,  that  the  boy  should  be  bound  for  five  years,  and  receive  his  board 
and  twenty  dollars  a  year.  Now,  Mr.  Greeley  had  ideas  of  his  own  on  the 
subject  of  apprenticeship,  and  he  objected  to  this  proposal,  and  to  every 
particular  of  it.  In  the  first  place,  he  had  determined  that  no  child  of  his 
should  ever  be  bound  at  all.  In  the  second  place,  he  thought  live  years  an 
unreasonable  time ;  thirdly,  he  considered  that  twenty  dollars  a  year  and 
board  was  a  compensation  ridiculously  disproportionate  to  the  services 
which  Horace  would  be  required  to  render;  and  finally,  on  each  and  all  cf 
these  points,  he  clung  to  his  opinion  with  the  tenacity  of  a  Greeley.  Mr.  Bliss 
appealed  to  the  established  custom  of  the  country ;  five  years  was  the 
usual  period;  the  compensation  offered  was  the  regular  thing;  the  binding 
was  a  point  essential  to  the  employer's  interest.  And  at  every  pause  in 
the  conversation,  the  appealing  voice  of  Horace  was  heard :  "  Father,  I 
gue»»  you  'd  better  make  a  bargain  with  Mr.  Bliss ;"  or,  "  Father,  I  guess 
it  won 't  make  much  difference;"  or,  "  Don't  you  think  you  'd  better  do  it, 
father?"  At  one  moment  the  boy  was  reduced  to  despair.  Mr.  Bliss  had 
given  it  as  his  ultimatum  that  the  proposed  binding  was  absolutely  indispen- 
sable ;  he  "  could  do  business  in  no  other  way."  "  Well,  then,  Horace,"  said 
the  father,  "  let  us  go  home."  The  father  turned  to  go ;  but  Horace  lingered ; 
toe  could  not  give  it  up ;  and  so  the  father  turned  again ;  the  negotiation 


FAREWELL   TO   FAMILY.  41 

was  re-opened,  and  after  a  prolonged  discussion,  a  compromise  waa 
effected.  And  so  the  father  went  home,  and  the  son  went  straight  to  the 
printing-office  and  took  his  first  lesson  in  the  art  of  setting  type. 

The  terms  of  the  agreement,  as  stated  by  Mr.  Greelej  in 
his  Recollections  were :  He  was  to  remain  in  the  office  until 
he  became  twenty  years  of  age,  be  allowed  board  only  for  the 
first  six  months,  and  thereafter,  in  addition,  $40  per  annum 
for  his  clothing.  Such  was  the  humble  contract  by  means  of 
which  he  who  became  the  founder  of  The  New- York  Tribune 
entered  into  the  business  of  printing. 

Soon  after  he  had  entered  upon  his  apprenticeship  the  others 
of  the  family  removed  to  Erie  county,  Pennsylvania,  whither 
the  father  had  some  time  before  journeyed,  and  where  he  had 
purchased  a  small  quantity  of  land,  mostly  primeval  forest, 
but  including  a  "  log-cabin "  and  four  acres  of  clearing. 
Before  their  departure,  Horace  walked  over  to  Westhaven  to 
bid  them  good-bye,  spending  a  Sunday  at  home.  They  tried 
hard  to  persuade  him  to  go  with  them,  and,  on  account  of 
there  being  some  things  in  the  conduct  of  the  office  at  Poult- 
ney  not  to  his  mind,  the  temptation  to  go  was  strong,  but  his 
ideas  of  good  faith  prevented  him  from  yielding.  The  members 
of  the  family  were  devotedly  attached  to  each  other,  and  the 
parting  was  one  of  deepest  sadness.  Horace's  return  walk  to 
Poultney,  as  he  says  himself,  was  one  of  the  slowest  and  sad- 
dest of  his  life.  They  proceeded  on  their  long  journey,  and 
the  place  which  had  known  them  all  so  well  knew  them  no 
more  forever.  When  Mr.  Parton  visited  the  farm,  more  than 
a  quarter  of  a  century  afterwards,  he  found  the  grass  growing 
\vhere  the  little  home  in  Westhaven  in  which  the  family  had 
longest  lived,  had  stood,  and  the  barn  in  which  they  had 
stored  their  hay  and  kept  their  cattle  leaning  forward,  like  a 
kneeling  elephant,  letting  in  the  daylight  through  ten  thou- 
sand apertures. 

As  a  printer-pupil,-  Horace  Greeley  was  exceedingly  apt. 
He  had  long  thought  of  the  subject,  and  in  the  course  of  his 
miscellaneous  reading,  especially  of  newspapers,  had  doubtless 
met  with  occasional  paragraphs  giving  him  correct  ideas  of 
the  practical  art.  And  hence,  when  the  foreman  had  once 


42  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GTCEELEY. 

described  "  the  case ''  to  liim,  he  knew  immediately  where  to 
find  the  types  for  every  letter,  punctuation  point,  spaces,  etc. 
Furnished  then  with  a  "  stick,"  "  rule,"  and  "  copy  "  (re-print, 
of  course)  he  wont  to  work,  not  much  unlike  an  old  hand  at 
the  business.  He  worked  steadily  and  quietly  at  the  case  all 
day,  and  when  evening  came  on  he  could  set  type  as  rapidly 
and  as  well  as  most  boys  who  have  been  weeks  at  the  business. 
Even  the  knack  of  "emptying  the  stick"  did  not  appear  to 
give  him  much  trouble,  and  he  did  not  "pi  "  a  line  for  weeks.3 
The  sanctum,  counting-room,  composition-room,  and  press- 
room of  the  Northern  Spectator  were  all  in  the  same  apart- 
ment; and,  it  may  be  added,  the  mailing-room  also,  which 
consisted  of  a  table  and  a  few  pigeon-holes.  The  only  printer 
entitled  to  be  called  a  journeyman  was  the  foreman,  who  set 
up  job-work,  read  proofs,  and  attended  to  matters  generally, 
giving  some  of  the  time  of  each  day  to  setting  up  type.  So 
that  in  reality,  Horace  Greeley  was  simply  the  junior  appren- 
tice in  the  office.  In  printer's  technical  phrase,  he  was  "  th-3 
devil;"  and  printers  need  not  be  told  that  from  a  time  whereof 
the  memory  of  man  runneth  not  to  the  contrary,  "  the  devil  " 
is  the  butt  of  the  whole  office.  But  Greeley  was  so  perfectly 
quiet,  inoffensive,  and  industrious,  that  the  boye  hardly  knew 
how  to  take  him  in.  They  threw  broken  types  at  him;  they 
pelted  him  with  "  wads;"  but  he  kept  on  at  his  work,  replying 
no  more  .than  if  he  were  an  automaton  type-Better.  On  the 
third  day  of  his  apprenticeship,  one  of  the  boys  took  the  ball 
which  was  then  used,  instead  of  the  modern  roller,  to  ink  the 
types  on  the  press,  and  gave  Horace  three  or  four  very  black 
impressions  on  his  white  head.  He  did  not  appear  to  mind 
it  at  all,  but  presently  left  the  office.  In  an  hour  or  so  he 
returned,  with  every  vestige  of  the  ink  removed,  and  quietly 

•The  "stick"  is  the  implement,  held  in  the  left  hand,  into  which  the 
types  are  placed,  with  the  right  hand.  An  ordinary  composing  stick 
holds  something  less  than  two  inches  :>f  matter,  measured  down  the 
column,  to  which,  of  course,  it  is  adjusted.  When  this  is  filled,  the  types 
must  be  taken  out  and  placed  in  a  galley  for  proof  taking.  Thus  to 
remove  the  types  from  the  stick,  without  having  them  disarranged 
("pied")  is  a  Jmack  not  often  easily  acquired.  Horace  Groeley  emptied 
Lis  stick  successfully  the  first  day  of  his  apprenticeship. 


OVERWORKED   APPRENTICE.  43 

proceeded  with,  his  work.  And  that  was  the  last  practical 
joke  perpetrated  upon  Horace  Greeley  during  his  apprentice- 
ship. Thenceforth,  the  boys  were  all  his  devoted  friends,  and 
though  he  was,  perhaps,  the  most  awkward  of  youths  in 
general  manners,  he  was  so  conscientious  and  diligent  in 
labour  and  so  well  informed,  it  may  be  doubted  whether  any 
apprentice  was  ever  more  highly  respected  by  his  fellow- 
printers  or  by  those  of  the  general  public  who  became 
acquainted  with  him. 

Nevertheless  it  is  true  that  he  was  by  no  means  wholly 
pleased  with  his  situation.  The  organization  and  manage- 
ment of  the  office  were  vicious,  as  he  himself  testifies.  An 
apprentice  should  have  but  one  master,  whereas  he  had  a 
series  of  them  and  often  two  or  three  at  once.  The  concern 
changed  owners  several  times,  coming  under  control  of  those 
who  were  not  practical  printers.  And  so  the  office  was  ill  and 
laxly  governed.  On  one  account  this  was  well  for  Horace 
Greeley,  for  the  apprentices  were  allowed  to  learn  whatever 
they  chose;  and  he  chose  to  learn  all  branches  of  the  art. 
On  the  other  hand  this  caused  him  to  work  over-much ;  and 
he  had  not  been  in  the  oflice  a  year  till  he  did  all  the  press- 
work  for  the  paper.  Printers  will  know  how  hard  this  work 
was,  when  told  that  the  paper  was  printed  on  an  old-fashioned 
double-pull  Ramage  (wooden)  press.  "  I  would  not  imply," 
says  Mr.  Greeley,  speaking  of  the  time  he  spent  at  East 
Poultney,  "that  I  worked  too  hard;  yet  I  think  few  appren- 
tices work  more  steadily  and  faithfully  than  I  did  throughout 
the  four  years  and  over  of  my  stay  in  Poultney.  "While  I 
lived  at  home,  I  had  always  been  allowed  a  day's  fishing,  at 
least  once  a  month  in  spring  and  summer,  and  I  once  went 
hunting;  but  I  never  Mshed  nor  hunted,  nor  attended  a  dance, 
nor  any  sort  of  party  or  fandango,  in  Poultney.  I  doubt  that 
I  even  played  a  game  of  ball."  It  thus  happened,  that  when 
these  four  years'  and  over  of  steady,  faithful  work  was  done, 
Horace  Greeley  was  graduated  to  the  degree  of  Journeyman 
with  quite  as  much  right  to  it,  pro  tner'do,  as  any  one  who 
ever  received  it  from  a  country  printing  office,  where,  by  ilia 


44  LITE  OF  HORACE  GREELEY. 

way,  very  many  of  our  most  successful  printers  have  learned 
the  business. 

Mr.  Bliss,  Horace  Greeley's  first  employer  in  the  printing 
business,  states,  in  a  letter  which  has  been  largely  published, 
that  he  "  doubts  if,  in  the  whole  term  of  his  apprenticeship,  he 
ever  spent  an  hour  in  the  common  recreations  of  young  men." 
This  is  probably  true  as  to  out-door  recreations ;  but  it  may 
well  be  doubted  whether  there  has  ever  yet  been  a  printer  who 
did  not  have  some  in-door  recreations.  Their  labour  is  both 
bodily  and  mental,  and,  therefore,  tiresome,  exhaustive.  It 
consumes  the  "  phosphorus  "  of  the  human  system  about  as 
much  as  any  other  employment.  Some  kind  of  recreation  is 
a  necessity.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  printers  are  generally  fond 
of  in-door  games  and  skiUul  therein.  Horace  Greeley,  a 
printer's  apprentice,  played  many  a  game  of  checkers,  or 
drafts,  with  three-em  and  two-em  "  quads  "  for  the  men,  and 
if  he  did  not  play  "poker"  with  quads  for  "chips"  his 
printer's  experience  may  be  accounted  as  absolutely  unique. 
He  was,  in  truth,  an  uncommonly  skilful  checker  player,  was 
good  at  chess,  and  better  than  usual  at  whist  and  other  inno- 
cent games  of  cards.  But  he  never  gambled  for  a  penny  in 
his  life.  He  indulged  in  these  games  for  recreation  only,  and 
never  for  this  purpose  on  Sunday.4  It  were  well  if  all 
printers, — and  all  men  for  that  matter, — were,  if  not  as  skilful 
as  guiltless  of  all  harm  in  these  games  as  was  Horace  Greeley. 

On  many  accounts  Poultney  was  an  excellent  place  in  which 
to  serve  an  apprenticeship.  The  community  was  essentially 
rural,  the  citizens  intelligent  and  moral ;  so  that  there  were 
few  temptations  to  dissipation  and  vice.  There  was  a  publie 

4  There  is  a  story  that  he  originated  the  popular  inquiry,  "  How  is  that 
for  high?"  It  is  said  that,  once  playing  a  four-handed  game  of  Old 
Sledge,  or  Seven  Up,  one  of  the  players  threw  down  the  tray  of  trumps, 
asking  " how  is  that  for  low?"  When  it  came  his  turn,  he  threw  down 
the  deuce,  exclaiming,  "  How  is  that  for  High?"  Though  the  deuce  could 
not  possibly  be  beaten  for  "  low,"  the  cream  of  the  joke  was  that  Mr. 
Greeley  saved  his  "  Jack  "  and  caught  a  ten-spot  on  the  very  next  trick. 
No  "  heathen  Chinee  "  ever  did  better.  This  is  said  to  be  the  origin  of  the 
comic  song  '-'  How  Is  that  for  High,"  than  which  none  has  been  more 
popular  on  the  boards,  especially  when  rendered  by  our  Chicago  Emersoa 


A    YOUNG   DEBATER.  45 

library  in  the  village,  the  first  with  which  Horace  Greeley 
became  acquainted.  "  I  have  never  since,"  he  says,  "  found  at 
once  books  and  opportunity  to  enjoy  them,  so  ample  as  while 
there;  I  do  not  think  I  ever  before  or  since  read  to  so  much 
profit."  In  addition  to  the  books,  he  also  had  the  advantages 
of  a  Debating  Society,  or  Lyceum,  whose  members  consisted 
of  many  of  the  most  intelligent  men  of  the  village,  whose 
meetings  were  held  once  a  week,  when  questions,  proposed  at 
previous  meetings,  were  debated  very  much  as  questions  aro 
debated  in  the  literary  societies  of  our  learned  institutions. 
The  exercises  were  public;  the  admission  was  free;  and  so 
popular  did  the  meetings  become  that  they  were  attended  by 
the  people  of  Poultney  generally, — babies  inclusive, — and  by 
many  from  the  surrounding  country.  Farmers  from  a  distance 
of  ten  miles  often  attended.  Horace  Greeley  joined  this 
society,  and,  though  a  mere  youth,  at  once  took  rank  as  a 
skilful  and  powerful  debater.  He  did  not  then  have,  and 
never  acquired,  "  the  graces  of  oratory,"  so  called,  but  he  was 
then,  as  he  ever  was,  an  interesting,  intelligent  speaker,  whose 
ideas  were  clear  and  clearly,  forcibly,  originally  expressed. 
His  voice  was  thin,  almost  like  a  whine;  his  gestures  were  not 
graceful;  but  his  arguments  were  to  the  point  and  his  informa- 
tion was  always  ample  and  almost  invariably  correct.  He  had 
probably  read  more  books  and  newspapers  than  any  ten 
members  of  the  Lyceum,  and  had  stored  their  contents  in  one 
of  the  most  capacious  and  retentive  memories  ever  possessed 
by  man.  And  hence  it  happened  that  the  youngest  member 
of  the  Poultney  Lyceum  became  its  intellectual  leader  and  its 
acknowledged  authority  on  disputed  points;  and  this  though 
he  never  wore  a  coat,  a  neck-tie,  nor  a  pair  of  gloves. 

Mr.  Bliss,  before  mentioned,  gives  the  following  account  of 
the  young  apprentice  at  Poultney: 

"  About  this  time,  a  sound,  well-read  theologian  and  a  practical  printer 
was  employed  to  edit  and  conduct  the  paper.  This  opened  a  desirable 
school  for  intellectual  culture  to  our  young  debutant.  Debates  ensued : 
historical,  political,  and  religious  questions  were  discussed;  and  often 
while  all  hands  were  engaged  at  the  font  of  types ;  and  here  the  purpose 
for  which  our  young  asp;  rant '  had  read  some '  was  made  manifest.  Such 


46  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELET. 

was  the  correctness  of  his  memory  in  what  he  had  read,  in  both  biblical 
and  profane  history,  that  the  reverend  gentleman  was  often  put  at  fault 
by  his  corrections.  He  always  quoted  chapter  and  verse  to  prove  the 
point  in  dispute.  On  one  occasion  the  editor  said  that  money  was  the 
root  of  all  evil,  when  he  was  corrected  by  the  '  devil,'  who  said  he  believed 
it  read  in  the  Bible  that  the  love  of  money  was  the  root  of  all  evil. 

"A  small  town  library  gave  him  access  to  books,  by  which,  together 
with  the  reading  of  the  exchange  papers  of  the  office,  he  improved  all  his 
leisure  hours.  He  became  a  frequent  talker  in  our  village  lyceum,  and 
often  wrote  dissertations. 

"In  the  first  organization  of  our  village  temperance  society,  the  ques- 
tion arose  as  to  the  age  when  the  young  might  become  members.  Fearing 
lest  his  own  age  might  bar  him,  he1  moved  that  they  be  received  when 
they  were  old  enough  to  drink — which  was  adopted  nem.  con. 

"Though  modest  and  retiring,  he  was  often  led  into  political  discus- 
sions  with  our  ablest  politicians,  and  few  would  leave  the  field  without 
feeling  instructed  by  the  soundness  of  his  views  and  the  unerring 
correctness  of  his  statements  of  political  events. 

"Having  a  thirst  for  knowledge,  he  bent  his  mind  and  all  his  energies 
to  its  acquisition,  with  unceasing  application  and  untiring  devotion ;  and 
I  doubt  if,  in  the  whole  term  of  his  apprenticeship,  he  ever  spent  an  hour 
in  the  common  recreation  of  young  men.  He  used  to  pass  my  door  as  he 
went  to  his  daily  meals,  and  though  I  often  sat  near,  or  stood  in  the  way, 
so  much  absorbed  did  he  appear  in  his  own  thoughts — his  head  bent 
forward  and  his  eyes  fixed  upon  the  ground,  that  I  have  the  charity  to 
believe  that  the  reason  why  he  never  turned  his  head  or  gave  me  a  look, 
was  because  he  had  no  idea  I  was  there !" 

The  notable  respect  and  influence  gained  by  Horace  Greeley, 
even  during  the  years  of  his  apprenticeship,  notwithstanding 
his  singular  dress  and  uncouth  manners,  are  happily  illustrated 
by  an  anecdote  told  by  a  distinguished  physician  of  New- 
York.  The  physician's  story  is  thus  reported  by  Parton: 

"  Did  I  ever  tell  you,"  he  is  wont  to  begin,  "  how  and  where  I  first  saw 
my  friend  Horace  Greeley  ?  Well,  thus  it  happened.  It  waa  one  of  the 
proudest  and  happiest  days  of  my  life.  I  was  a  country  boy  then,  a 
farmer's  son,  and  we  lived  a  few  miles  from  East  Poultney.  On  the  day 
in  question  I  was  sent  by  my  father  to  sell  a  load  of  potatoes  at  the  store 
in  East  Poultney,  and  bring  back  various  commodities  in  exchange. 
Now  this  was  the  first  time,  you  must  know,  that  I  had  ever  been  entrusted 
with  so  important  an  errand.  I  had  been  to  the  village  with  my  father 
often  enough,  but  now  I  was  to  go  alone,  and  I  felt  as  proud  and 
independent  as  a  midshipman  the  first  time  he  goes  ashore  in  command 
of  a  boat.  Big  with  the  fate  of  twenty  bushels  of  potatoes,  off  I  drove  — 
reached  the  village— sold  out  my  load — drove  roun  1  to  the  avern — put  up 


YOUNG  GBEELEY'S  TOILET.  47 

my  horses,  and  went  in  to  dinner.  This  going  to  the  tavern  on  my  own 
account,  all  by  myself,  and  paying  my  own  bill,  was,  I  thought,  the 
crowning  glory  of  the  whole  adventure.  There  were  a  good  many  people 
at  dinner,  the  sheriff  of  the  county  and  an  ex-member  of  Congress  among 
them,  and  I  felt  considerably  abashed  at  first ;  but  I  had  scarcely  begun 
to  eat,  when  my  eyes  fell  upon  an  object  so  singular  that  I  could  do  little 
else  than  stare  at  it  all  the  while  it  remained  in  the  room.  It  was  a  tall, 
pale,  white-haired,  gawky  boy,  seated  at  the  further  end  of  the  table.  He 
was  in  his  shirt-sleeves,  and  he  was  eating  with  a  rapidity  and  awkward- 
ness that  I  never  saw  equalled  before  nor  since.  It  seemed  as  if  he  was 
eating  for  a  wager,  and  had  gone  in  to  win.  He  neither  looked  up  nor 
round,  nor  appeared  to  pay  the  least  attention  to  the  conversation.  My 
first  thought  was,  '  This  is  a  pretty  sort  of  a  tavern  to  let  such  a  fellow  as 
that  sit  at  the  same  table  with  all  these  gentlemen;  he  ought  to  come  in 
with  the  hostler.'  I  thought  it  strange,  too,  that  no  one  seemed  to  notice 
him,  and  I  supposed  he  owed  his  continuance  at  the  table  to  that  circum- 
stance alone.  And  so  I  sat,  eating  little  myself,  and  occupied  in  watching 
the  wonderful  performance  of  this  wonderful  youth.  At  length  the 
conversation  at  the  table  became  quite  animated,  turning  upon  some 
measure  of  an  early  Congress ;  and  a  question  arose  how  certain  members 
had  voted  on  its  final  passage.  There  was  a  difference  of  opinion ;  and 
the  sheriff,  a  very  finely-dressed  personage,  I  thought,  to  my  boundless 
astonishment,  referred  the  matter  to  the  unaccountable  Boy,  saying,  '  Aint 
that  right,  Greeley  ?'  '  No,'  said  the  Unaccountable,  without  looking  up, 
'you  're  wrong.'  'There,'  sakl  the  ex-member,  'I  told  you  so.'  .'And 
you  're  wrong,  too,'  said  the  still-devouring  Mystery.  Then  he  laid  down 
his  knife  and  fork,  and  gave  the  history  of  the  measure,  explained  the 
state  of  parties  at  the  time,  stated  the  vote  in  dispute,  named  the  leading 
advocates  and  opponents  of  the  bill,  and,  in  short,  gave  a  complete 
exposition  of  the  whole  matter.  I  listened  and  wondered;  but  what 
surprised  me  most  was,  that  the  company  received  his  statement  as  pure 
gospel,  and  as  settling  the  question  beyond  dispute  —  as  a  dictionary 
settles  a  dispute  respecting  the  spelling  of  a  word.  A  minute  after,  the 
boy  left  the  dining-room,  and  I  never  saw  him  again,  till  I  met  him,  years 
after,  in  the  streets  of  New- York,  when  I  claimed  acquaintance  with  him 
as  a  brother  Vermonter,  and  told  him  this  story,  to  his  great  amusement." 

The  future  great  journalist  was  so  ill  clad  during  his  appren- 
ticeship that  there  are  those  still  living  at  Poultney  who 
recollect  their  feelings  of  sadness  in  his  behalf,  on  seeing  him 
walking  to  the  office  in  the  bitter  cold  mornings  of  a  Vermont 
Winter.  He  always  walked  rapidly, — moving  as  though  he 
were  a  little  too  loose  in  the  joints,  as  they  say, — and  with  his 
gloveless  hands  in  his  pockets  to  protect  them  from  the  frost. 
His  homely  dress  was  a  constant  source  of  laughter  among  the 


48  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GREELET. 

boys,  and  it  is  related  that  on  one  occasion  when  there  was  to 
be  an  unusually  interesting  debate  at  the  Lyceum,  a  young 
man  who  was  noted  for  the  elegance  of  his  toilet  and  the 
length  of  his  store  account,  advised  Jlorace  to  get  a  new  suit 
of  clothes  for  the  great  debate.  "  No,"  said  he,  "  I  guess  I'd 
better  wear  my  old  clothes  than  run  in  debt  for  new  ones." 
And  in  his  homely  garb  he  won  the  decision  in  the  discussion. 

Half  the  sum  annually  received  by  Horace  Greeley  would 
have  provided  him  with  comfortable,  presentable  clothing. 
But  he  had  not  during  his  apprenticeship,  and  never  acquired, 
the  slightest  regard  for  his  personal  appearance.  Moreover, 
he  was  extremely  economical  at  this  period  of  his  life,  with 
the  object  of  aiding  his  father  in  his  pioneer  home.  Thither 
he  sent  every  dollar  that  he  could  spare,  caring  nothing  for  the 
laughter  of  the  young  and  the  derision  of  the  thoughtless. 
By  reason  of  his  own  hard  labour  and  these  timely  remittances 
of  his  son,  Zaccheus  Greeley  was  able  to  pay  all  his  indebted- 
ness on  his  farm,  and  gradually  to  improve  and  enlarge  it,  so 
that  at  the  time  of  his  death  it  had  become  an  extensive  and 
valuable  estate.  During  Horace's  term  of  apprenticeship  he 
was  allowed  a  month  on  two  separate  occasions  to  visit  the 
family  homestead.  This  journey  of  some  six  hundred  miles 
he  accomplished  by  walking  part  of  the  way,  and  on  "line 
boats  "  on  the  Erie  canal,  whose  "  cent  and  a  half  a  mile,  mile 
and  a  half  an  hour"  many  yet  remember.  "The  days  passed 
slowly  yet  smoothly,"  he  says,  "  on  those  gliding  arks,  being 
enlivened  by  various  sedentary  games;  but  the  nights  were 
tedious  beyond  any  sleeping-car  experience.  At  daybreak, 
you  were  routed  out  of  your  shabby,  shelf-like  berth,  and 
driven  on  deck  to  swallow  fog  while  the  cabin  was  cleared  of 
its  beds  and  made  ready  for  breakfast."  Mr.  Greeley  decidedly 
objected  to  the  return  of  "  the  good  old  ways,"  if  they  should 
include  line  boats  and  the  little  tubs  which  used  to  do  duty  as 
steamboats  on  Lake  Erie,  in  which  he  had  some  disagreeable 
experiences  on  these  journeys  home  and  return. 

Horace  Greeley's  first  essays  in  writing  were  with  neither 
pen  nor  pencil.  They  were  set  up  in  types,  being  directly 
transferred  thereto  from  his  mind  while  he  worked  at  the  case. 


A   FUGITIVE- SLAVE   CTIASE.  4i'! 

They  consisted  of  condensations  of  news  paragraphs  and  o% 
other  articles,  for  the  whole  cf  which  there  was  not  room  in 
the  paper.  An  ardent  politician  and  zealons  supporter  of  tin 
Adams  party,  we  may  be  sure  he  also  contributed  politi^a' 
paragraphs  and  "  squibs  "  to  the  paper,  which  was  emphatically 
of  his  way  of  thinkirg.  His  "  dissertations,"  read  before  the 
Lyceum,  were  his  first  foi  inal  compositions.  They  were  char- 
acterized by  being  upon  practical  topics,  which  were  treated  in 
a  straight-forward,  strong  manner,  rather  than  in  the  orna- 
mental  style  so  prevalent  in  debating  societies  and,  indeed, 
with  young  writers  generally.  He  never  blossommed  into  *,hs 
flowery  style  in  essays  which  were  to  be  read. 

He  relates  that  among  the  incidents  of  his  sojourn  ir».  Poult- 
ney  that  made  most  impression  on  his  mind  was  "  a  fugitive 
slave-chase."  A  young  negro,  held  as  a  slave  in  a  neigbouring 
town  of  New  York,  had  transported  himself  to  Poultney,  and 
was  there  minding  his  business  and  doing  labour,  when  his 
"  owner,"  with  due  official  following,  came  along  to  arrest  and 
return  him.  "  I  never  saw,"  says  Mr.  Greeley,  "  so  large  a 
muster  of  men  and  boys  so  suddenly  on  our  village-green  as 
his  advent  incited;  and  the  result  was  a  speedy  disappearance 
of  the  chattel,  and  the  return  of  his  master,  disconsolate  and 
niggerless,  to  the  place  whence  he  came.  Everything  on  our 
side  was  impromptu  and  instinctive;  and  nobody  suggested 
that  envy  or  hate  of  '  the  South,'  or  of  New  York,  or  of  the 
master,  had  impelled  the  rescue.  Our  people  hated  injustice 
and  oppression,  and  acted  as  if  they  could  n't  help  it." 

Another  incident  of  which  he  had  a  fresh  recollection  after 
more  than  forty  years  was  the  celebration  of  the  fiftieth 
anniversary  of  American  Independence.  Many  veterans  of 
the  He  volution  were  present,  in  whose  eyes,  as  he  thought, 
the  recurrence  of  the  nation's  anniversary  seemed  to  rekindle 
"  the  light  of  other  days."  "  I  doubt,"  he  remarks,  "  that 
Poultney  has  since  been  so  thrilled  with  patriotic  emotion  as 
on  that  4th  of  July,  1826;  and  when  we  learned  a  few  days 
later,  that  Thomas  Jefferson  and  John  Adams,  the  author 
and  the  great  champion,  respectively,  of  the  Declaration,  had 
both  died  on  that  day,  and  that  the  messengers  bearing  South 
4 


«"»0  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GEEELEI. 

i  nd  North,  respectively,  the  tidings  of  their  decease  had  met 
:'n  Philadelphia  under  the  shadow  of  that  Hall  in  which  our 
Independence  was  declared,  it  seemed  that  a  Divine  attestation 
had  solemnly  hallowed  and  sanctified  the  great  anniversary 
by  the  impressive  ministration  of  Death." 

And  so,  upon  the  whole,  the  years  of  Horace  Greeley's 
apprenticeship  went  happily  by.  He  had  become  an  excellent 
p.-'nter,  though  not  an  uncommonly  swift  compositor;  he  had 
grswn  in  stature  and  in  mind;  had  all  the  while  been  an 
tt-r^est  advocate  of  Temperance  and  a  practical  tee-totaler; 
ard  had  acquired  nc  unfortunate  habits  and  no  vices.  With 
the  world  row  all  before  him  where  to  choose,  having  acquired 
a  trade  by  means  of  which  he  could  reasonably  expect  to  earn 
an  independent  livelihood,  he  could  look  back  over  the  years 
spent  in  the  office  of  The  Northern  Spectator  with  pardonable 
satisfaction  and  gratification;  with  that  peculiar  happiness 
which  comes  of  duty  conscientiously  and  well  done.  "  They 
say,"  he  said,  not  long  before  the  close  of  his  eventful  and 
influential  life,  "  that  apprenticeship  is  distasteful  to,  and  out 
of  fashion  with,  the  boys  of  our  day:  if  so,  I  regret  it  for 
their  sakes.  To  the  youth  who  asks,  *  How  shall  I  obtain  an 
education?'  I  would  answer,  'Learn  a  trade  of  a  good  master.' 
I  hold  firmly  that  most  boys  may  thus  better  acquire  tho 
knowledge  they  need  than  by  spending  four  years  in  college." 


CHArTEE    III. 

A  JOURNEYMAN  PRINTER. 

Departure  from  Poultney —  Visits  his  Father  —  "Works  as  a  Journeyman 
at  Jamestown  and  Lodi,  New  York  —  Chopping  Wood  Again  —  Em- 
ployed on  the  Erie  (Pennsylvania)  Gazette  —  Offered  a  Partnership, 
Declines  —  Returns  To  His  Father's  —  In  Vain  Tries  to  Procure  Work 
in  the  West  —  Resolves  to  Go  to  New- York  —  Divides  his  Earnings 
with  his  Father  —  The  Journey  to  New -York  —  Arrival  There  with  a 
Cash  Capital  of  Ten  Dollars  —  Diligent  Search  for  Work — Sets  up  a 
"Lean"  New  Testament  —  Chicken-pox  Proof — Varied  Experience  as 
a  Journeyman  in  the  Great  City  —  Steady  Progress  —  Visits  New 
England  —  Business  on  his  own  Account. 

BY  the  terms  of  his  contract  of  apprenticeship,  Horace 
Greeley  was  to  remain  in  the  office  of  the  Northern  Spectator 
until  he  should  become  twenty  years  of  age.  But  in  June, 
1830,  some  ten  months  before  the  expiration  of  his  apprentice- 
ship, that  journal  discontinued  publication,  and  the  contract 
by  that  fact  was  terminated.  lie  had  gone  to  Poultney  an 
uncouth,  unknown  youth.  Now  that  he  was  about  to  depart, 
he  found  that  he  had  many  admiring  friends,  who  bade  him 
good-by  with  unaffected  sorrow  <to  part  with  him,  and  sin- 
cerest  good  wishes  for  hio  future.  Nearly  thirty  years  after- 
wards he  said  to  moie  tlian  a  hundred  thousand  readers,  when 
speaking  of  Poultnev.  "I  have  never  since  known  a  commu- 
nity so  generally  moral,  intelligent,  industrious,  and  friendly, — 
never  one  where  so  much  good  was  known,  and  so  little  evil  said, 
of  neighbour  by  neighbour  ;'  He  shook  many  a  friend  by  the 
hand,  and  stepping  into  a  wagon,  proceeded,  in  company  with 
a  friend  of  like  years,  to  Comstock's  Landing,  some  twelve 
miles  distant,  on  the  Champlain  Canal,  where  they  waited, 
through  a  dreary  day  of  pelting  rain,  for  a  line-boat  to  take 
them  to  Troy,  New 'York,  \vhence  they  purposed  travelling 
westward  to  Buffalo,  by  similar  conveyance.1 

1  Mr.  Parton  makes  a  most  graphic,  touching  scene  of  young  Greeley's 
departure  from  Poultuey.  lie  tells  how  the  landlord  gave  him  an  ovcrcoati 

(51) 


32  JJFE   OF   HORACE  GREELET. 

The  friends  travelled  together  to  a  place  not  far  west  war  1  of 
Rochester,  whence  young  Greeley  proceeded  to  Buffalo,  by  the 
line-boat,  thence  by  steamboat  to  Dunkirk.  From  Dunkirk, 
the  journey  was  made  on  foot.  It  was  on  this  journey  that  he 
made  his  best  day's  walk,  from  Fredonia  to  his  father's  farm, 
a  distance  of  forty-five  miles  over  a  bad  road,  equal  to  fifty  of 
good.  He  was  ever  a  firm  believer  in  solitary  pedestrianism 
as  most  favorable  to  patient  meditation  and  self-improvement. 

He  made  a  visit  of  some  weeks  at  home,  and  then  sought 
work  at  his  trade  in  various  directions,  but  with  indifferent 
success.  He  had  a  situation  for  a  short  time  at  Jamestown, 
New  York,  and  afterwards,  some  time,  however,  inter- 
vening, at  Lodi  (now  Gowanda),  where  he  worked  at  the  case 
for  $11  per  month,  board  included.  Here  he  remained  about 
six  weeks,  earning  in  that  period  about  half  what  a  good, 
steady  compositor  will  now  earn  in  a  single  week,  working  on 
the  paper  which  he  established.  lie  accomplished  something 
for  the  craft.  His  employer  at  Lodi  could  afford  to  hire  a 
journeyman  no  longer,  and  he  made  a  pedestrian  journey 
home,  about  January  1,  1831. 

Here  he  went  to  work  again,  chopping,  vrith  his  father  and 
brother,  but,  as  he  says,  not  very  efficiently  noi  satisfactorily. 
He  became  fully  convinced  thai;  the  life  of  a  pioneer  was  one 
to  which  he  was  poorly  adapted.  Wherefore,  after  a  month — 
one  of  bitter  cold  weather — of  hard  labour  in  the  forest 

accompanied  by  a  brief  speech,  worthy  of  any  post-prandial  occasior. ; 
how  the  landlady  gave  him  a  Bible ;  how  Horace  rose,  pi  t  his  stick  through 
his  little  bundle,  took  the  overcoat  (inagin^r^)  v/ver  his  other  arm,  said 
"good-by,"  and  set  off;  how  his  mends  followed  him  with  their  eyes,  until 
a  turn  in  the  road  hid  the  bent  and  chaml/ling  figure  from  their  sight ;  how 
it  was  a  fine,  cool,  breezy  morning  in  the  mouth  of  Jane,  1830 ;  how  nature 
had  assumed  those  robes  of  brilliant  green  which  she  wears  only  in  June, 
and  welcomed  the  wanderer  forth  with  that  heavenly  smile  which  plays 
upon  her  changeful  countenance  only  when  she  is  attired  in  her  best ;  how, 
light  of  heart  and  step,  the  traveller  walked  on,  etc.,  etc.  It  is  a  pity  to 
spoil  all  this  beautiful  writing;  but  it  nas  to  be  done.  In  fact,  Mr.  Greeley 
did  it  when  he  said  (Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life,  p.  75)  that  he  left 
Poultney  in  a  wagon,  precisely  as  described  in  the  text  above.  And  tne 
day  a  day  of  pelting  rain  too !  Not  one  of  "  the  ravishing  beauties  of 
June." 


AT  ERIE, 

primeval,  lie  again  sought  employment  in  his  chosen  profession. 
Accordingly,  he  visited  Erie,  Pennsylvania,  where  he  found 
work  on  The  Gazette  of  that  city  at  $15  per  month,  and  board. 
"This  was  the  first  newspaper,"  says  Mr.  Greeley  in  his  auto- 
biography, "  whereon  I  was  employed  that  made  any  money 
for  its  owner,  and  thus  had  a  pecuniary  value.  It  had  been 
started  twenty  years  or  so  before,  when  borough  and  county 
were  both  thinly  peopled,  almost  wholly  by  poor  young  men, 
and  it  had  grown  with  the  vicinage  until  it  had  a  substantial, 
profitable  patronage.  Its  proprietor,  Mr.  Joseph  M.  Sterrett, 
now  in  the  prime  of  life,  had  begun  on  The  Gazette  as  a  boy, 
and  grown  up  with  it  into  general  consideration  and  esteem; 
his  journeymen  and  apprentices  boarded  at  his  house,  as  was 
fit;  and  I  spent  here  five  months  industriuosly  and  agreeably. 
Though  still  a  raw  youth  of  twenty  years,  and  knowing  no  one 
in  the  borough  when  I  thus  entered  it,  I  made  acquaintances 
there  who  are  still  valued  friends;  and  before  I  left,  I  was 
offered  a  partnership  in  the  concern;  which,  though  I  had 
reasons  for  declining,  was  none  the  less  flattering  as  a  mark  of 
appreciation  and  confidence." 

At  length  work  failed  in  the  Gazette  office.  He  tried  to  ob- 
tain a  situation  elsewhere,  but,  as  he  says,  "  the  West  seemed 
to  be  labouring  under  a  surfeit  of  printers."  One  was  adver- 
tised for  to  take  charge  of  a  journal  at  "Wilkesbarre,  Pennsyl- 
vania, and  he  applied  for  the  place,  but  without  success.  "  I 
would  gladly  have  given,"  he  remarks  in  his  Recollections  of 
this  period,  "faithful  labour  at  case  and  press  through  some 
years  yet  for  $15  a  month  and  board,  or  even  less;  but  it  was 
not  to  be  had.  So,  upon  full  consideration,  I  decided  to  turn 
my  steps  toward  the  Commercial  Emporium,  while  still  con- 
siderably younger  than  I  would  have  preferred  to  be  on  making 
such  a  venture." 

Accordingly  he  paid  a  parting  visit  to  his  father's,  and  pre- 
pared for  what  was  reasonbly  supposed  would  be  a  long  absence. 
Nor  were  any  great  preparations  necessary.  They  consisted  of 
his  dividing  the  money  he  had  earned  at  Erie  with  his  father, 
remaining  a  few  days  at  home,  and  bidding  the  family  good-by. 
These  things  done,  he  started  on  his  journey  to  New- York, 


t54  LUTiI  Of  HORACE   QKEELET. 

with  $?&  in  his  pocket,  and  very  little  extra  clothing  in  hia 
onndle. 

It  was  now  midsummer,  the  weather  dry  and  hot.  He 
turned  his  face  toward  the  Erie  canal,  by  which  he  voyaged 
most  of  the  way  across  the  State  of  New  York.  But  at 
Gaines,  some  forty  miles  westward  of  Rochester,  lived  the  only 
friend  he  had  in  the  long  route.  He  traversed  on  foot  the 
dusty  "ridge  road:'  eastward  from Lockport  the  day  before  he 
reached  this  friend.  It  was  a  hot  day,  and  the  water  he  *vas 
compelled  frequently  to  drink  seemed  to  him  very  hari;  so 
that  by  night-fall  he  fancied  it  had  covered  his  mouth  and 
throat  with  a  scale  like  that  often  found  incrusting  a  long-used 
tea-kettle.  Though  the  region  was  gently  rolling  and  very  fertile, 
he  should  have  more  enjoyed,  he  says,  a  saunter  over  New  Eng- 
land hills  and  rocks,  sweetened  by  draughts  from  New  England 
wells  and  springs.  He  remained  with  his  friend  Saturday 
night  and  Sunday  till  afternoon,  when  they  wajked  down  to 
the  canal  together  and  waited  long  for  a  boat.  None  coming 
before  nightfall  he  bade  his  friend  good-by,  confident  that  a 
line-boat  would  soon  heave  in  sight,  bound  in  the  right  direc- 
tion. After  waiting  till  near  midnight,  he  started  down  the 
tow-path  and  walked  through  the  pitchy  darkness  to  Brock- 
port,  about  fifteen  miles,  where  he  took  a  line-boat  in  the 
morning.  His  sleepy  tendencies  much  amused  his  fellow-pas- 
gers,  to  whom  "sparking  Sunday  night"  aiforded  what  was 
supposed  to  be  the  proper  explanation. 

The  journeyman  in  search  of  work  left  the  canal  at  Schenec- 
tady  and  proceeded  on  foot  to  Albany,  whence  he  went  by 
Bteamboat  to  New- York,  arriving  there  on  the  morning  of 
August  17,  1831.  The  city  of  New- York  was  then  less  than 
one-third  of  its  present  size,  and  had  probably  less  than  one- 
tenth  of  its  present  commercial  importance.  Brooklyn,  the 
greatest  and  most  magnificent  metropolitan  development  of 
New- York,  was  not  incorporated  as  a  city  until  three  years 
afterwards.  Not  a  single  railroad  reached  the  city.  No  line 
of  ocean  steamers  brought  passengers  to  her  hotels  nor  goods 
to  her  merchants  from  any  foreign  port.  "  Still,  to  my  eyes," 
eays  Mr.  Greeley,  "  which  had  never  till  yesterday  gazed  on  a 


EIKST   SEES   NEW-YORK.  55 

city  of  even  20,000  inhabitants,  nor  seen  a  sea-going  vessel, 
her  miles  square  of  mainly  brick  or  stone  Louses,  and  her 
furlongs  of  masts  aud  yards,  afforded  ample  incitement  to  a 
wonder  and  admiration  akir.  to  awe."  He  was  not  yet 
twenty-one  years  old;  was  tall,  slender,  pale,  and  plain;  had  ten 
dollars  in  his  pocket;  Summer  clothing  worth  as  much  more, 
nearly  all  on  his  person;  and  as  complete  a  knowledge  of 
printing  as  could  then  be  gained  in  country  offices.  He 
frankly  admits  that  his  unmistakably  rustic  manner  and 
address  did  not  favour  that  immediate  command  of  remu- 
nerating employment  which  was  his  most  urgent  need. 

However,  he  stepped  lightly  from  the  boat,  not  at  all 
encumbered  with  luggage, — his  personal  estate  being  all  tied 
up  in  a  pocket-handkerchief, — and,  moving  rapidly  away  from 
the  detested  hiss  of  escaping  steam,  presently  found  himself 
walking  up  Broad  street  in  quest  of  a  boarding-house.  He 
entered  one  near  the  corner  of  Wall;  but  the  price  of  board 
in  that  aristocratic  establishment  was  $6  per  week,  and  he 
followed  the  suggestion  of  the  host  by  immediately  proceeding 
in  search  of  more  democratic  quarters.  Wandering  thence,  he 
never  could  tell  how,  to  the  North  River  side  of  the  city,  he 
stopped  at  an  humble  edifice  whereon  the  sign  "  Boarding " 
caught  his  eye,  and  forthwith  closed  a  bargain  for  shelter  and 
subsistence  at  $2.50  per  week.  His  host  was  Mr.  Edward 
McGolrick,  of  No.  168  West  street,  and  his  establishment  was 
half  boarding-house  and  the  remainder  grog-shop.  It  was 
quietly  and  decently  kept,  however,  and  Mr.  McGolrick  and 
family  were  kind  and  friendly. 

The  next  motion  in  order,  of  course,  was  to  procure  employ- 
ment; and  the  young  printer  had  no  sooner  taken  a  hearty 
breakfast,  without  meat,  than  he  went  forth  on  the  common 
errand  of  so  many  millions  of  men — asking  leave  to  toil.  In 
his  ignorance  of  the  city,  he  traversed  many  a  street  in  which 
he  might  as  well  have  looked  for  a  shower  of  larks  as  for  a 
printing-office.  It  might  appear  that  he  adopted  the  plan  of 
going  through  the  city  street  by  street,  which  was  an  excellent 
plan,  to  give  him  a  knowledge  of  the  metropolis,  but  addsd 
many  miles  of  useless  walking  to  one  in  search  of  work  ;.n  a 


56  LIFE  OF   HOKACE   GREELEY. 

printing-office.  In  the  course  of  this  day  (which  was  a 
Friday)  and  the  next,  however,  he  must  have  visited,  he 
thought,  fully  two-thirds  of  the  printing-offices  on  Manhattan 
Island,  and  when  the  sun  went  down  on  Saturday  night  he 
had  not  caught  a  gleam  of  success.  "  It  was  midsummer,"  he 
observes,  "when  business  in  New- York  is  habitually  dull; 
and  my  youth  and  unquestionable  air  of  country  greenness, 
must  have  told  against  me.  When  I  called  at  The  Journal  of 
Commerce,  its  editor,  Mr.  David  Hale,  bluntly  told  me  I  wa-,-5 
a  runaway  apprentice  from  some  country  office;  which  was  a 
very  natural,  though  mistaken,  presumption.  I  returned  to 
my  lodging  on  Saturday  evening,  thoroughly  weary,  disheart- 
ened, disgusted  with  New- York,  and  resolved  to  shake  its  dust 
from  my  feet  next  Monday  morning,  while  I  could  still  leave 
with  money  in  my  pocket,  and  before  its  almshouse  could 
foreclose  upon  me.  But  that  was  not  to  be.  On  Sunday 
afternoon  and  evening  several  young  Irishmen  called  at 
McGolrick's,  in  their  holiday  saunterings  about  town;  and 
being  told  that  I  was  a  young  printer  in  quest  of  work, 
interested  themselves  in  my  effort  with  the  spontaneous  kind- 
ness of  their  race.  One  among  them  happened  to  know  a 
place  where  printers  were  wanted,  and  gave  me  the  requisite 
direction;  so  that,  on  visiting  the  designated  spot  next  morn- 
ing, I  readily  found  employment;  and  thus,  when  barely  three 
days  a  resident,  I  had  found  anchorage  in  New-York." 

And  now  it  happened  that  the  very  "  country  greenness  " 
which  appeared  to  tell  so  much  against  him  on  Friday  and 
Saturday,  was  all  in  his  favour  on  Monday.  The  establish- 
ment in  which  he  had  his  first  work  in  New-York  was  that  of 
John  T.  West,  over  the  publishing-house  of  McElrath  and 
B?.ngs,  No.  85  Chatham  Street,  and  the  work  was  at  his  call 
pimply  because  no  printer  who  knew  the  city  would  accept  it. 
The  nature  of  the  work  is  thus  described,  and  all  printers  will 
rmderstand  how  annoying  and  "  lean  "  a  job  it  was: 

"It  was  the  composition  of  a  very  small  (32mo)  New  Testament,  in 
d'.  -.rble  columns,  of  Agate  type,  each  column  barely  12  ems  wide,  witli  a 
cwlTe  column  of  notea  in  Pearl,  only  4  ems  wide;  the  text  thickly 
.jadied  vri'b  references  by  Greek  and  superior  letters  to  the  n<Hee,  which 


ANCHORED  IN   NEW- YORK.  57 

of  course  were  preceded  and  discriminated  by  corresponding  indices,  with 
prefatory  and  supplementary  remarks  on  each  Book,  set  in  Pearl,  and 
only  paid  for  as  Agate.  The  type  was  considerably  smaller  than  any  to 
•which  I  had  been  accustomed;  the  narrow  measure  and  thickly  sown 
Italics  of  the  text,  with  the  strange  characters  employed  as  indices, 
rendered  it  the  slowest,  and  by  far  the  most  difficult,  work  I  had  ever 
undertaken;  while  the  making  up,  proving,  and  correcting  twice,  and 
even  thrice  over,  preparatory  to  stereotyping,  nearly  doubled  the  time 
required  for  ordinary  composition.  I  was  never  a  swift  type-setter;  I 
aimed  to  be  an  assiduous  and  correct  one;  but  my  proofs  on  this  work  at 
first  looked  as  though  they  had  caught  the  chicken-pox,  and  were  in  the 
worst  stage  of  a  profuse  eruption.  For  the  first  two  or  three  weeks, 
being  sometimes  kept  waiting  for  letter,  I  scarcely  made  my  board; 
while,  by  diligent  type-sticking  through  twelve  to  fourteen  hours  per  day, 
I  was  able,  at  my  best,  to  earn  but  five  to  six  dollars  per  week.  As 
scarcely  another  compositor  could  be  induced  to  work  on  it  more  than 
two  days,  I  had  this  job  in  good  part  to  mj^self;  and  I  persevered  to  the 
end  of  it.  I  had  removed,  very  soon  after  obtaining  it,  to  Mrs.  Mason's 
shoemaker  boarding-house  at  the  corner  of  Chatham  and  Duane  Streets, 
nearly  opposite  my  work;  so  that  I  was  enabled  to  keep  doing  nearly  all 
the  time  I  did  not  need  for  meals  and  sleep." a 

It  is,  perhaps,  impossible  for  one  not  a  printer  to  appreciate 
the  great  amount  and  sublime  quality  of  patience  necessary 
in  the  composition  of  such  a  job.  That  Horace  Greeley  did 
not  therefrom  imbibe  a  detestation  of  the  New  Testament 
must  be  regarded  as  proof  conclusive  that  his  faith  in  its 
inspiration  and  truth  was  most  firmly  and  deeply  anchored  in 
his  mind. 

Having  completed  the  Testament,  he  was  again  without 
employment  for  about  a  fortnight,  notwithstanding  he  made 
daily  efforts  to  find  more.  lie  thus  had  an  opportunity  of 
attending,  as  a  spectator,  the  sittings  of  a  Tariff  Convention, 
which  was  held  at  this  time  in  the  American  Institute,  and 
presided  over  by  Hon.  William  Wilkins,  of  Pennsylvania, 
His  next  work  was  on  a  monthly  magazine,  printed  on  Ann 
Street;  but  the  periodical  soon  deceased,  and  he  was  left  with- 
out his  wages.  The  next  month  saw  him  back  at  West's,  on 
Chatham  Street,  arid 'again  employed  on  a  religious  work, — a 
commentary  on  the  book  of  Genesis  by  the  Ilev.  Gr3org6 
Bush.  Of  this  che  chirography  was  blind;  the  author,  ir-.ade 

*  Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life,  p.  80. 


58  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GREELET. 

many  vexatious  alterations  in  proof;  the  page  was  small  and 
the  type  close;  but  though  the  reverse  of  fat,  in  printers' 
jargon,  it  was  not  nearly  so  abominably  lean  as  the  Testament, 
and  he  regretted  to  reach  the  end  of  it.  Again  thrown  out 
of  employment  he  seriously  meditated  engaging  in  some  other 
business  than  printing,  and  probably  would  have  done  so  had 
any  other  business  offered  him  a  chance.  But  the  season  was 
unusually  cold.  There  was  an  ice-blockade.  All  branches  of 
trade  sympathized  with  printing,  and  were  exceptionally  dull. 
So,  perforce,  he  stuck  to  his  "stick,"  and  the  commercial 
world  thereby  lost  the  making  of  a  poor  merchant,  and  gained 
a  great  journalist. 

The  next  situation,  continuing  for  any  considerable  period, 
which  young  Greeley  obtained  was  in  the  office  of  The  Spirit 
of  the  Times,  a  weekly  journal,  established  about  the  begin- 
ing  of  the  year  1832,  by  Messrs.  William  T.  Porter  and  James 
Howe,  two  young  printers,  of  whom  the  former  had  worked 
with  Greeley  at  West's.  The  Spirit  was  devoted  to  sporting 
intelligence,  and  was  from  the  beginning  a  first-rate  paper  of 
its  kind.  Mr.  Porter  became  celebrated  as  a  writer  and  au- 
thority in  all  sporting  matters,  and  the  journal  still  flourishes 
under  the  editorship  of  Mr.  George  Wilkes,  and  has  long  been 
confessedly  at  the  head  of  American  publications  whose  prin- 
cipal object  is  the  circulation  of  sporting  intelligence.  That 
the  editorial  scope  of  the  paper  has  not  been  "  cabined,  cribbed, 
and  confined,"  however,  to  a  single  specialty,  may  be  con- 
cluded from  the  fact  that,  during  the  late  war  of  the  rebellion, 
the  ablest  criticisms  upon  its  conduct  and  the  most  searching 
expositions  of  its  military  imbeciles,  appeared  in  Wilkes's 
Spirit.  When  Horace  Greeley  worked  as  a  compositor  in  the 
office,  it  was  just  beginning  a  precarious  existence.  He  as- 
sisted, it  seems,  in  the  composition  of  the  first  number.  He 
eays:  "I  think  it  was  a  little  after  midnight,  on  the  1st  of 
January,  1832,  that  we  compositors  delivered  the  forms  of  the 
first  number  into  the  hands  of  the  pressmen  in  an  upper  story 
in  Fulton  street.  The  concern  migrated  to  Wall  street  the 
next  March,  finding  a  location  very  near  the  present  site  of  the 
Merchants'  Exchange;  and  I  clung  to  it  through  the  ensuing 


TALKING   AND  TYPE-SETTING.  59 

Spring  and  Summer;  its  foreman,  Francis  Y.  Story,  being 
nearly  of  my  own  age,  and  thenceforth  my  devoted  friend. 
But  the  founders  and  editors  were  also  quite  young;  they  were 
inexperienced  in  their  calling,  without  capital  or  influential 
friends,  having  recently  drifted  from  the  country  to  the  city 
much  as  I  did;  and  their  paper  did  not  pay, — I  know  it  was 
difficult  to  make  it  pay  me, — especially  through  the  dreary 
cholera  Summer  of  1832." 

The  city  of  New- York  was  never  paralyzed  as  it  was  during 
that  Summer.  The  disease  was  new,  and  the  accounts  of  its 
recent  ravages  abroad  were  calculated  to  appal  the  stoutest 
heart.  Those  who  could  get  away,  left  the  city;  scarcely  any 
one  entered  it;  trade  was  dead  and  industry  languished.  Hor- 
ace Greeley  sometimes  met  two  if  not  three  palanquins,  bear- 
ing cholera  patients  to  some  hospital,  in  his  short  walk  from 
dinner  on  Chatham  street  to  his  work  on  Wall  street.  One 
died  at  his  boarding-house.  But  the  terrible  epidemic  passed 
off  as  cool  evenings  came  on,  and  fugitives  and  business  re- 
turned; and  all,  save  the  dead  and  the  bereaved,  was  as  before. 

Horace  Greeley  had  now  been  in  New- York,  a  journeyman 
printer,  a  little  more  than  a  year.  He  had  not  all  the  time 
been  engaged  at  his  trade,  but  had  never  been  idle.  His  ex- 
perience as  a  journeyman  was  similar  to  his  experience  as  an 
apprentice.  His  awkward  manners,  his  singular  dress,  brought 
upon  him  some  ridicule,  and  his  simplicity  and  good  nature 
made  him  "game"  for  many  an  innocent  practical  joke  (if 
there  be  such  a  thing  as  an  innocent  practical  joke).  Yet  he 
was  greatly  respected  on  account  of  his  faithfulness  and  skill 
as  a  printer,  and  his  superior  talents  and  intelligence.  He  was 
a  great  talker,  and,  what  is  more,  he  could  constantly  talk  while 
setting  type  without  its  at  all  interfering  with  the  correctness 
or  dispatch  of  his  work.  Not  a  few  printers  have  been  able 
thus  to  carry  on  two  trains  of  ideas  at  the  same  time,  but  few 
so  wonderfully  as  Horace  Greeley.  It  seemed  that  his  talking 
did  not  at  all  interfere  with  his  type-setting,  nor  type-setting 
with  his  conversation.  He  still  wore  clothes  of  the  most  out- 
landish fits,  and  continued  to  expend  precious  little  money 
upon  his  person.  He  did  not  misspend  any  of  his  earnings 


60  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GREELEY. 

and  constantly  remitted  a  considerable  portion  of  them  to  hia 
father.  Nor  did  he,  though  he  always  had  money  by  him,  ex- 
hibit the  least  symptom  of  avarice  or  closen'stedness.  Never 
a  fellow-printer  in  need  applied  to  him  for  help  whom  he  did 
not  assist,  and  in  his  generous  nature  he  loaned  many  of  them 
money  when  it  would  have  doubtless  been  better  for  them  had 
he  withheld  it,  allowing  them  to  learn,  perforce,  the  value  and 
wisdom  of  a  thoughtful  economy.  His  own  expenses  had  been 
surprisingly  small,  ever  since  his  arrival  in  New- York,  so  that, 
notwithstanding  his  remittances  home,  he  was  able  during  the 
autumn  of  the  year  under  review  to  revisit  the  scenes  of  his 
early  life. 

He  left  New- York  early  in  October  and  by  way  of  Provi- 
dence and  Boston  travelled  back  to  "the  old  Londonderry 
hive."  Here  he  spent  some  days  with  uncles,  aunts,  and 
cousins,  having  merry  times  gathering  fruits  in  the  orchards, 
and  graping  in  the  forests.  His  relatives  were  widely  scat- 
tered over  southern  New-Hampshire,  and  some  of  them  were 
in  eastern  Vermont.  But  he  went  to  see  them  all,  and  all  were 
right  glad  to  welcome  him  to  their  homes  and  hearts.  These 
journeys  were  made  on  foot,  and  added  new  zest  to  an  appetite 
naturally  good.  "  Reaching  Stoddard,"  he  says,  "  I  stepped  in- 
to a  convenient  tavern  and  called  for  dinner.  My  breakfast  had 
been  quite  early;  the  keen  air  and  rough  walk  had  freshened 
my  appetite;  I  was  shown  into  a  dining-room  with  a  well- 
spread  table  in  the  centre,  and  left  to  help  myself.  There  were 
steaks,  chickens,  tea,  coffee,  pies,  etc.,  and  I  did  ample  justice 
to  all.  'What  is  to  pay?'  I  asked  the.  landlord  on  re-entering 
the  bar-room.  *  Dinner  18f  cents,'  he  replied.  I  laid  down  the 
required  sum,  and  stepped  off,  mentally  resolving  that  I  would, 
in  mercy  to  that  tavern,  never  patronize  it  again." 

He  returned  to  New- York  by  the  route  he  went,  in  time  to 
vote  the  anti-Jackson  ticket  at  the  Presidential  election.  After 
this  he  was  employed  by  Mr.  J.  S.  Redfield,  since,  the  eminent 
publisher,  who  was  then  conducting  a  stereotyping  establish- 
ment. The  work  was  agreeable  and  the  pay  good  as  well  as 
prompt,  so  that  the  close  of  his  experience  as  a  journeyman 
was  highly  pleasant  and  satisfactory.  Near  the  end  of  this 


AT   WOEK   AGAIN. 


61 


year  lie  made  arrangements  to  enter  into  business  on  his  own 
account. 

But  before  describing  his  first  ventures  in  printing  and  pub- 
lishing for  himself,  let  us  review  the  course  of  his  life  thus  far, 
as  respects  moral,  political,  and  religious  questions. 


THURLOW  WEED.— See  pages  87,  etc. 


CHAPTEK  IV. 

SOCIAL  MORALS  — FAITH  — POLITICS. 

Horace  Greeley  a  Born  Reformer  —  A  New  England  Pioneer  of  Tern- 
perance — Opposition  to  the  Use  of  Tobacco  —  His  Religious  Faith  — 
His  Own  Statement  as  to  How  He  Became  a  Universalist  —  A  Very 
Young  Politician  —  Discussion  of  the  Slavery  Question  in  1819-20  — 
An  Anti-Slavery  Boy  — The  "Era  of  Good  Feeling"  — Era  of  Per- 
son al- Preference  Parties  —  Election  of  John  Quincy  Adams  to  the 
Presidency  —  The  "  Anti  -  Mason  "  Excitement  —  Jackson  Elected 
President  in  1828  — Defeat  of  Henry  Clay  in  1832  — Horace  Greclcy 
Goes  into  Business  for  Himself. 

HORACE  GKEELET,  with  his  Puritan  lineage,  New  England 
birth,  and  early  associations,  conld  hardly  have  helped  growing 
up  without  the  development  of  a  real  respect  for  virtue,  pure 
morality,  and  such  reforms  as  might  seem  to  have  in  view  the 
practical  good  of  men  and  the  honour  of  human  nature. 
There  are  those, —  and  they  constitute  the  majority,  —  who 
profess  to  believe  in  "  letting  well  enough  alone."  There  are 
others,  —  and  they  constitute,  as  yet  in  the  history  of  the 
world,  the  select  minority,  —  who  believe  in  making  well 
enough  better,  and  then  best.  ITorace  Greeley  was  born  in 
the  select  minority.  The  majority  would  do  well  enough  if 
they  really  believed  what  they  say;  but  when  their  profession 
is  translated  into  fact,  we  too  often  discover  that  they  only 
believe  in  letting  things  alone,  unless  they  are  so  bad  as  to  be 
absolutely  unendurable.  With  them  a  reformer  and  a  destruc- 
tionist  are  precisely  the  same;  and  they  are  constantly  fretting, 
not  that  well  enough  but  bad  enough  may  be  attacked,  van- 
quished, and  put  in  utter  rout.  They  are  as  afraid  of  those 
eternal  irrepressible  conflicts  by  which  alone  progress  is 
eliminated,  and  improvement  made  in  our  social,  moral,  and 
political  systems  and  institutions,  as  a  hurt  duck  is  of  gun- 
powder. If  they  were  to  have  their  way,  Galileo  himself, 

(62) 


A  TEMPERANCE   BOY.  63 

were  he  to  rise  from  the  dead,  could  not  discover  that  the 
world  moves,  and  would  surely  be  executed  if  he  should  say 
that  it  did. 

Whether  it  was  from  the  blood  descended  from  those  who 
had  been  engaged  in  the  strife  of  the  old  siege  of  Derry,  or 
however  we  may  account  for  it,  it  is  certain  that  Horace 
Greeley  was  born  a  fighter.  Certainly  no  one  ever  lived  who 
had  more  repugnance  to  physical  conflict,  brawls  of  any  kind, 
cruelty  in  any  form;  and  no  military  chieftain  ever  fought  his 
foe  more  bravely  than  he  contended  against  the  systems  by 
which  such  and  many  other  evils  are  made  not  only  possible 
but  common.  He  was  an  intellectual  combatant,  and  used  the 
weapons  of  the  mind,  —  argument,  appeal,  condemnatory 
criticism,  eloquence,  invective,  wit,  humour,  etc.  —  from  a 
very  early  period  in  his  life.  Up  to  the  time  thereof  which 
we  have  now  reached  in  this  biographical  sketch  the  most 
notable  instance  of  his  native-born  character  of  reformer  was 
upon  'the  subject  of  Temperance. 

He  had  never  received  any  sound  teachings  upon  the  sub- 
ject even  in  theory,  certainly  not  in  practice.  From  the  day 
of  his  birth  to  his  developing  manhood  he  lived  in  com- 
munities, where  drinking  spirituous  liquors  was  regarded  by 
nearly  every  one,  whether  of  the  clergy  or  laity,  not  only  as 
well  enough,  but  as  a  duty,  or,  at  any  rate,  as  a  physical 
necessity.  He  expressly  tells  us  in  his  Recollections,  that 
during  his  childhood  there  was  no  merry-making,  no  enter- 
tainment of  relatives  or  friends,  scarcely  a  casual  gathering  of 
two  or  three  neighbours  for  an  evening's  social  chat,  without 
strong  drink.  Cider,  always,  while  it  remained  drinkable, 
rum  at  all  seasons  and  on  all  occasions,  were  expected  and 
provided.  The  universality  of  the  custom  of  drinking  then 
prevailing  cannot  be  better  shown  than  by  Mr.  Greeley's  own 
description: 

"  No  house  or  barn  was  raised  without  a  bountiful  supply  of  the  latter, 
and  generally  of  both.  A  wedding  without  'toddy,'  'flip,'  'sling,'  or 
'  punch,'  with  rum  undisguised  in  abundance,  would  have  been  deemed  a 
poor,  mean  affair,  even  among  the  penniless ;  while  the  more  fortunate 
and  thrifty  of  course  dispensed  wine,  brandy,  and  gin  in  profusion. 


64  LIFE   OF   HORACE  OREELEY. 

Dancing — almost  the  only  pastime  -wherein  the  sexes  jointly  partici- 
pated—  was  always  enlivened  and  stimulated  by  liquor.  Militia  train- 
ings  —  then  rigidly  enforced  at  least  twice  a  year  —  usually  wound  up 
with  a  drinking  frolic  at  the  village  tavern.  Election  days  were  drinking 
days,  as  they  still  too  commonly  are ;  and  even  funerals  were  regarded  as 
inadequately  celebrated  without  the  dispensing  of  spirituous  consolation: 
so  that  I  distinctly  recollect  the  neighbourhood  talk,  in  1820,  after  the 
funeral  of  a  poor  man's  child,  that,  if  he  had  not  been  mean  as  well  aa 
poor,  he  would  have  cheered  the  hearts  of  his  sympathizing  friends  by 
treating  them  to  at  least  one  gallon  of  rum.  I  have  heard  my  father  say 
that  he  had  mowed  through  the  haying  season  of  thirty  successive  years, 
and  never  a  day  without  liquor;  and  the  account  of  an  Irishman  who 
mowed  and  pitched  throughout  one  haying,  drinking  only  buttermilk, 
while  his  associates  drank  rum,  yet  accomplished  more,  and  with  less 
fatigne,  than  any  of  them,  was  received  with  as  much  wondering  incre- 
dulity as  though  it  had  been  certified  that  he  lived  wholly  on  air.  Nay: 
we  had  an  ordination  in  Amherst  nearly  fifty  years  ago,  settling  an  able 
and  popular  young  clergyman  named  Lord  (I  believe  he  is  now  the 
venerable  ex-President  of  Dartmouth  College)  to  the  signal  satisfaction 
of  the  great  body  of  our  people;  and,  according  to  my  recollection, 
strong  drink  was  more  generally  and  bountifully  dispensed  than  on  any 
previous  occasion;  bottles  and  glasses  being  set  on  tables  in  front  of 
many  farmers'  houses  as  an  invitation  to  those  who  passed  on  their  way 
to  or  from  the  installation  to  stop  and  drink  freely.  We  have  worse 
liquor  now  than  we  had  then;  and  delirium  tremens,  apoplexy,  palsy, 
&c.,  come  sooner  and  oftener  to  those  who  use  it ;  but  our  consumers  of 
strong  drink  are  a  class ;  whereas  they  were  then  the  whole  people.  The 
pious  probably  drank  more  discreetly  than  the  ungodly;  but  they  all 
drank  to  their  own  satisfaction,  and,  I  judge,  more  than  was  consistent 
with  their  personal  good." 

As  it  was  in  the  region  in  which  Horace  Greeley  was  reared, 
BO  it  was  elsewhere  throughout  the  country.  Nor  was  there  a 
single  association  in  the  whole  land  which  adopted  the  prin- 
ciple and  practice  of  Total  Abstinence  until  some  time  after 
he  had  outspelled  all  the  spellers  of  Londonderry  and  Amherst. 
The  American  Temperance  Society  was  yet  totally  unknown, 
and  did  not  place  total  abstinence  from  all  alcoholic  beverages 
in  its  creed  until  after  Horace  Greeley  had  entered  the  print- 
ing business  for  himself  in  New-York.  He  was  in  a  glorious 
minority  of  one,  therefore,  and  that  one  only  a  lad  of  thirteen 
years  of  age,  when,  on  the  first  day  of  January,  1824,  he 
deliberately  resolved  to  drink  no  more  distilled  liquors.  It  is 
doubtfnl  whether  at  this  time  he  had  ever  heard  of  a  Tern- 


perunce  Society;  it  would  be  remarkable  indeed  if  lie  had, 
seeing  that  a  Temperance  Society  in  those  days  was  rara  avis 
in  terris,  so  rare  a  bird  on  earth,  in  fact,  as  to  have  yet  made 
no  visible  chirp  or  flutter.  This  resolution  the  lad  faithfully 
kept.  On  one  occasion,  indeed,  when  the  neighbours  and 
their  boys  were  collected  together  in  considerable  number,  at 
the  annual  sheep-shearing,  his  resolve  was  universally  con- 
demned, and  some  liquor  was  forced  down  his  throat  by 
several  youngsters  older  than  himself,  —  the  last,  unquestiona- 
bly, which  ever  found  passage  by  that  route. 

We  have  already  seen  that  he  took  an  active  part  in  the  for- 
mation of  the  first  Temperance  Society  in  Poultney,  and 
moved,  when  the  question  of  age  of  membership  was  up  for 
determination,  that  any  one  might  be  received  who  was  old 
enough  to  drink.  This  faculty  of  putting  a  clear  argument  in 
a  motion,  or  a  single  statement,  he  always  possessed  in  largo 
development.  He  took  an  influential  part  in  the  progress  of 
tlio  Temperance  cause  in  Poultney,  and  when  he  left  that  vil- 
lage at  the  close  of  his  apprenticeship  there  were  many 
adherents  of  the  new  reform  in  town  and  country.  The  mental 
process  by  which  young  Horace  Greeley,  being  a  born  reformer, 
reached  the  principle  of  total  abstinence,  can  be  easily  traced. 
He  perceived  that  the  use  of  liquor  was  accompanied  and  fol- 
lowed by  much  evil,  and  by  no  good;  that  it  dragged  many  a 
man  down  to  poverty,  misery,  dishonour,  and  never  raised  an 
unfortunate  man  to  his  feet,  to  lead  him  into  ways  of  pleasant- 
ness and  paths  of  peace.  He  perceived  that  one  of  the  first 
duties  of  all  good  men  is  self-denial.  He  therefore  correctly 
and  logically  placed  Total  Abstinence  as  among  the  Christian 
duties;  among  the  duties  of  all  who  would  by  precept  and  ex- 
ample make  the  world  somewhat  better  for  their  having  lived 
in  it.  About  the  time  he  set  up  his  own  establishment  in 
New- York,  this  Ileform,  of  which  he  was  one  of  the  first  pio- 
neers in  New-England,  had  begun  to  receive  considerable 
public  attention,  and  soon  exerted  a  beneficent  influence 
throughout  most  portions  of  the  nation. 

Another  evil  touching  our  social  morals  and  manners  which 
he  very  heartily  condemned,  was  the  use  of  tobacco.  Hia 
5 


CO  LITE   OF   HORACE   GKEELET. 

language  in  condemnation  of  this  habit  was  always  even  un- 
commonly energetic,  and  lie  never  used  the  weed  in  any  shape, 
nor  could  placidly  endure  the  use  of  it  by  others.  Herein,  and 
perhaps  herein  only,  he  was  "thin-skinned."  But  it  was  the 
result  of  physical  feeling  rather  than  of  reasoning.  His 
antipathy  began  before  he  was  old  enough  to  reason  much. 
When  he  was  four  years  old,  going  to  school  from  his  grand- 
father Woodburn's,  a  party  of  visitors  went  off  to  a  neigh- 
bour's, leaving  some  stumps  of  cigars  on  table  and  mantle. 
These  the  youngsters  smoked,  with  what  result  can  well  be 
imagined.  Horace  was  almost  deathly  sick  and  from  that  day 
forth  had  nothing  but  intense  disgust  for  the  cause  of  his 
boyish  indiscretion  and  affliction. 

Other  evils,  or  supposed  evils,  of  a  like  nature, — tending,  as 
he  thought,  to  diminish  the  social  happiness  and  virtue  of 
men, — he  subsequently  combatted  with  the  fervour  of  the 
Reform  spirit. 

I  now  approach  a  subject  of  great  delicacy,  but  one  which 
cannot  be  avoided  by  those  who  desire  to  have  something  like 
a  complete  picture  of  Horace  Greeley'e  life  and  character.  It 
will  be  generally  agreed,  perhaps,  that  one's  religious  faith  is 
pre-eminently  one's  own  matter;  to  be  regarded  among  gen  tie- 
men  as  a  sacred  thing.  Happily,  Mr.  Greeley  treated  of  this 
subject  fully  and  clearly  during  his  lifetime,  leaving  no  doubt 
as  to  his  general  opinions.  Whether  they  be  correct  or 
whether  they  be  erroneous,  they  were  his;  and  I  do  not  see 
how  they  could  possibly  be  set  forth  with  more  fairness 
than  in  his  own  words.  In  his  "Recollections  of  a  Busy 
Life  "  he  devotes  a  chapter  to  "  My  Faith,"  which  is  herewith 
transcribed  in  full,  and  of  course  without  either  approval  or 
disapproval.  It  is  as  follows: 

"I  must  have  been  about  ten  years  old,  when,  in  some  school-book, 
whereof  I  have  forgotten  the  name,  I  first  read  an  account  of  the  treat- 
ment of  the  Athenians  by  Demetrius,  called  Poliorcetes  (Destroyer  of 
Cities),  one  of  the  successors  of  'Macedonia's  madman.'  I  cannot  re-dis- 
cover that  account;  so  I  must  be  content  with  the  far  tamer  and  less  vivid 
narration  of  the  French  historian  Bollin : — 


HIS   FAITH.  67 

••  'Demetrius  had  withdrawn  himself  to  Ephesus  after  the  Battle  of  Ipsus  [wherein  he 
was  routed]  and  thence  embarked  for  Greece;  his  whole  resources  being  trusted  to  the 
affection  of  the  Athenians,  with  whom  he  had  left  his  fleet,  money,  and  wife  Deidamia. 
But  he  was  strangely  surprised  and  offended  when  he  was  met  on  his  way  by  ambassiidora 
from  the  Athenians,  who  came  to  apprise  him  that  he  could  not  be  admitted  into  their  city, 
because  the  people  had,  by  a  decree,  prohibited  the  reception  of  any  of  the  kings;  they 
also  informed  him  that  his  consort,  Deidamia,  had  been  conducted  to  Megara  with  all  the 
honours  and  attendance  due  to  her  dignity.  Demetrius  was  then  sensible  of  the  value  o* 
honours  and  homages  extorted  by  fear,  and  which  did  not  proceed  from  the  will.  The 
posture  of  his  affairs  not  permitting  him  to  revenge  the  perfidy  of  that  people,  he  con- 
tented himself  with  intimating  his  complaints  to  them  in  a  moderate  manner,  ana 
demanded  his  galleys;  with  which,  as  eoou  as  he  had  received  them,  he  sailed  toward 
the  Chersonesua.'  " 

"  Not  many  mouths  elapsed  before,  through  one  of  those  strange  and 
sudden  mutations  which  were  frequent  throughout  his  career,  the  fortunes 
of  Demetrius  were  completely  restored,  and  he  was  enabled  to  settle  his 
running  account  with  those  who  had  proved  so  treacherous  in  his  adver- 
sity. I  return  here  to  the  narration  of  Roll  in: — 

"  'Athens,  as  we  have  already  observed,  had  revolted  from  Demetrius,  and  shut  her 
gates  against  him.  But,  when  that  prince  thought  he  had  sufficiently  provided  for  the 
security  of  his  territories  in  Asia,  he  moved  against  that  rebellious  and  ungrateful  city, 
with  a  resolution  to  punish  her  as  she  deserved.  The  first  year  was  devoted  to  the  conquest 
of  the  Messeuians,  and  of  some  other  cities  which  had  quitted  his  party;  but  he  returned 
the  next  season  to  Athens,  which  he  closed,  blocked  up,  and  reduced  to  the  last  extrem- 
ity, by  cutting  oft"  all  influx  of  provisions.  A  fleet  of  a  hundred  and  fifty  sail,  sent  by 
king  Ptolemy  to  succour  the  Athenians,  and  which  appeared  off  the  coast  of  ^Egina, 
afforded  them  but  a  transient  joy ;  for,  when  this  naval  force  saw  a  strong  fleet  arrive 
from  Peloponnesus  to  the  assistance  of  Demetrius,  besides  a  great  number  of  other  vessels 
from  Cyprus,  and  that  the  whole  amounted  to  three  hundred,  they  weighed  anchor 
and  fled. 

"  'Although  the  Athenians  had  issued  a  decree  by  which  they  made  it  a  capital  offence 
for  any  person  even  to  mention  a  peace  with  Demetrius,  the  extremity  to  which  they  were 
reduced  obliged  them  to  open  their  gates  to  him.  When  he  entered  the  city,  he  com- 
manded the  inhabitants  to  assemble  in  the  theatre,  which  he  surrounded  with  armed 
troops,  and  posted  his  guards  on  either  side  of  the  stage  where  the  dramatic  pieces  were 
wont  to  be  performed ;  and  then  descending  from  the  upper  part  of  the  theatre,  in  the 
manner  usual  with  actors,  he  showed  himself  to  the  multitude,  who  seemed  more  dead 
than  alive,  and  awaited  the  event  in  inexpressible  terror,  expecting  it  would  prove  their 
sentence  to  destruction;  but  he  dissipated  their  apprehensions  by  the  first  words  ho 
uttered;  for  he  did  not  raise  his  voice  like  a  man  enraged,  nor  deliver  himself  in  any 
passionate  or  insulting  terms;  but  softened  the  tones  of  his  voice,  and  only  addressed  to 
them  gentle  complaints  and  amicable  expostulation..  He  pardoned  their  offence  and  re- 
stored them  to  his  favour, — presenting  them,  at  the  same  time,  with  100,000  measures  of 
corn  [wheat],  and  reinstating  such  magistrates  as  were  most  agreeable  to  them.  The  joy 
of  this  people  may  be  easily  conceived  from  the  terrors  with  which  they  were  previously 
affected ;  and  how  glorious  must  that  prince  be  who  could  always  support  so  admirable  a 
character!1  " 

"  Reflecting  with  admiration  on  this  exhibition  of  a  magnanimity  too 
rare  in  human  annals,  I  was  moved  to  inquire  if  a  spirit  so  nobly,  so 
wisely,  transcending  the  mean  and  savage  impulse  which  man  too  often 
disguises  as  justice,  when  it  is  in  essence  revenge,  might  not  be  reverently 
termed  Divine ;  and  the  firm  conclusion  to  which  I  was  finally  led,  imported 
that  the  old  Greek's  treatment  of  vanquished  rebels  or  prostrate  enemies 


68  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREEr.EY. 

must  forcibly  image  and  body  forth  that  of  the  '  King  immortal,  invisible, 
and  only  wise  God.' 

"When  I  reached  this  conclusion,  I  had  never  seen  one  who  was  called, 
or  who  called  himself,  a  Universalist;  and  I  neither  saw  one,  nor  read  a 
page  of  any  one's  writings,  for  years  thereafter.  I  had  only  heard  that 
there  were  a  few  graceless  reprobates  and  scurvy  outcasts,  who  pretended 
to  believe  that  all  men  would  be  saved,  and  to  wrench  the  Scriptures  into 
some  sort  of  conformity  to  their  mockery  of  a  creed.  I  had  read  the  Bible 
through,  much  of  it  repeatedly,  but  when  quite  too  infantile  to  form  any 
coherent,  definite  synopsis  of  the  doctrines  I  presumed  to  be  taught 
therein.  But,  soon  after  entering  a  printing-office,  I  procured  exchanges 
with  several  Uuiversalist  periodicals,  and  was  thenceforth  familiar  with 
their  methods  of  interpretation  and  of  argument,  though  I  first  heard  a 
sermon  preached  by  one  of  this  school,  while  passing  through  Buffalo, 
about  1830;  and  I  was  acquainted  with  no  society,  and  no  preacher,  of 
this  faith,  prior  to  my  arrival  in  New- York  in  August,  1831 ;  when  I  made 
my  way,  on  the  first  Sunday  morning  of  my  sojourn,  to  the  little  chapel 
in  Grand  Street,  near  Pitt, —  about  the  si/e  of  an  average  country  school- 
house,  —  where  Rev.  Thomas  J.  Sawyer,  then  quite  young,  ministered  to  a 
congregation  of,  perhaps,  a  hundred  souls;  to  which  congregation  I  soon 
afterwards  attached  myself:  remaining  a  member  of  it  until  he  left 
the  city. 

u  I  am  not,  therefore,  to  be  classed  with  those  who  claim  to  have  been 
converted  from  one  creed  to  another  by  studying  the  Bible  alone.  Cer- 
tainly, upon  re-reading  that  book  in  the  light  of  my  new  convictions,  I 
found  therein  abundant  proof  of  their  correctness  in  the  averments  of 
patriarchs,  prophets,  apostles,  and  of  the  Messiah  himself.  But  not  so 
much  in  particular  passages,  however  pertinent  and  decisive,  as  in  the 
spirit  and  general  scope  of  the  Gospel,  —  so  happily  blending  inexorable 
punishment  for  every  offence  with  unfailing  pity  and  ultimate  forgiveness 
for  the  chastened  transgressor,  —  thus  saving  sinners  from  sin  by  leading 
them,  through  suffering,  to  loathe  and  forsake  it ;  and  in  laying  down  its 
Golden  Rule,  which,  if  of  universal  application  (and  why  not?),  must  be 
utterly  inconsistent  with  the  infliction  of  infinite  and  unending  torture 
as  the  penalty  of  transient,  and  often  ignorant,  offending,  did  I  find 
ample  warrant  for  my  hope  and  trust  that  all  suffering  is  disciplinary 
and  transitional,  and  shall  ultimately  result  in  universal  holiness  and 
consequent  happiness. 

"In  the  light  of  this  faith,  the  dark  problem  of  Evil  is  irradiated,  and 
virtually  solved.  'Perfect  through  suffering'  was  the  way  traced  out  for 
the  great  Captain  of  our  salvation :  then  why  not  for  all  the  children  of 
Adam?  To  say  that  temporary  affliction  is  as  difficult  to  reconcile  with 
divine  goodness  as  eternal  agony  is  to  defy  reason  and  insult  common 
sense.  The  history  of  Joseph's  perfidious  sale  into  slavery  by  his  brethren, 
and  the  Divine  overruling  of  that  crime  into  a  means  of  vast  and  per- 
manent blessings  to  the  entire  family  of  Jacob,  is  directly  in  point. 
Once  conceive  that  an  Omniscient  Beneficence  presides  over  and  directs 


69 

the  entire  course  of  human  affairs,  leading  ever  onward  and  upward  to 
universal  purity  and  bliss,  and  all  evil  becomes  phenomenal  and  pre- 
parative, —  a  mere  curtain  or  passing  cloud,  which  hides  for  a  moment 
the  light  of  the  celestial  and  eternal  day. 

,  "  I  am  not  wise  enough,  even  in  my  own  conceit,  to  assume  to  say 
where  and  when  the  deliverance  of  our  race  from  evil  and  suffering  shall 
be  consummated.  Perceiving  that  many  leave  this  stage  of  being 
depraved  and  impenitent,  I  cannot  believe  that  they  will  be  transformed 
into  angels  of  purity  by  the  intervention  of  a  circumstance  so  purely 
physical  and  involuntary  as  death.  Holding  that  the  government  of  God 
is  everywhere  and  always  perfect  (however  inadequate  may  be  our  com- 
prehension of  it)  I  infer  that,  alike  in  all  worlds,  men  will  be  chastised 
whenever  they  shall  need  to  be,  and  that  neither  by  suicide,  nor  any 
other  device,  can  a  single  individual  escape  the  penalty  of  his  evil-doing. 
If  man  is  punished  because  he  needs  to  be,  —  because  that  is  best  for 
him,  —  why  should  such  discipline  be  restricted  to  this  span  of  life? 
While  I  know  that  the  words  translated  hell,  eternal,  etc.,  in  our  version 
of  the  Bible,  bear  various  meanings  which  the  translators  have  be- 
fogged, —  giving  hell,  the  grave,  the  pit,  etc.,  as  equivalents  of  the  one 
Hebrew  term  that  signifies  the  unseen  home  of  departed  souls, —  and 
while  I  am  sure  that  the  luxuriant  metaphors  whereby  a  state  of  anguish 
and  suffering  are  depicted  were  not  meant  to  be  taken  literally,  —  I  yet 
realize  that  human  iniquity  is  often  so  flagrant  and  enormous  that  its 
punishment,  to  be  just  and  efficient,  must  be  severe  and  protracted.  How 
or  where  it  will  be  inflicted  are  matters  of  incident  and  circumstance, 
not  of  principle  nor  of  primary  consequence.  Enough  that  it  will  be 
administered  by  One  who  '  doth  not  willingly  (that  is,  wantonly)  afflict 
nor  grieve  the  children  of  men,'  but  because  their  own  highest  good 
demands  it,  and  would  be  prejudiced  by  his  withholding  it.  But  I  do 
not  dogmatize  nor  speculate.  I  rest  in  a  more  assured  conviction  of  what 
Tennyson  timidly,  yet  impressively,  warbles,  in  mourning  the  death  of 
his  beloved  friend :  — 

"  •  O,  yet  we  trnst  that,  somehow,  good 
Will  be  the  final  goal  of  111, 
To  pangs  of  nature,  sins  of  will, 
Defects  of  doubt,  and  taints  of  blood ; 

"  'That  nothing  walks  with  aimless  feet; 
That  not  one  life  shall  be  destroyed, 
Or  cast  as  rubbish  to  the  void, 
When  God  hath  made  the  pile  complete ; 

»•  'That  not  a  worm  is  cloven  in  vain; 

That  not  a  moth,  with  vain  desire, 
Is  shrivelled  in  a  fruitless  flre, 
Or  but  subserves  another's  gain  1 

M 'Behold  1    We  know  not  anything: 

I  can  but  trust  that  good  shall  fall 
At  last,  —  far  off,  —  at  last,  to  all. 
And  every  Winter  change  to  Spring.' 


fO  LIFE  OF  HORACE   GREELEY. 

"Twenty  years  earlier  Mrs.  Hemans,  when  on  the  brink  of  the  angelic 
life,  was  blest  with  a  gleam  from  within  the  celestial  gates,  and,  in  almost 
her  last  sonnet,  faintly  refracted  it  as  follows:  — 

"'ON  RECORDS  OF  IMMATURE  GENIUS. 
M  '  O,  judge  in  thoughtful  tenderness  of  those 

Who,  richly  dowered  for  life,  are  called  to  die 
Ere  the  soul's  flame,  through  storms,  hath  won  repose 

In  truth's  divinest  ether,  still  and  high! 
Let  their  mind's  riches  claim  a  trustful  sigh; 
Deem  them  but  sad,  sweet  fragments  of  a  strain, 

First  notes  of  some  yet  struggling  harmony 
By  the  strong  rush,  the  crowding  joy  and  pain 

Of  many  inspirations  met  and  held 

From  its  true  sphere.    O  soon  it  might  have  swelled 
Majestically  forth  1    Nor  doubt  that  He 

Whose  touch  mysterious  may  on  earth  dissolve 

Those  links  of  music,  elsewhere  will  evolve 
Their  grand,  consummate  hymn,  from  passion-gusts  made  free  I* 

:  A  i  jftvJMOUnce  timid  and  tentative  these  and  many  kindred  utterances 
tn  AoUtnn  po<#ts,  I  mean  only  that  the  great  truth,  so  obscurely  hinted  by 
otte,  and  so  douotingly  asserted  by  thj  other,  had  long  before  been  more 
firmly  grasped,  fcjd  more  boldly  proclaimed,  by  seers  like  Milton  and 
Pope,  and  has  in  t/ar  age  been  affirmed  and  systematically  elucidated  by 
the  calm,  cogent  re^oning  of  Ballou,  the  critical  research  of  Balfour,  the 
fervid  eloquence  of  dmpin,  and  hundreds  beside  them,  until  it  is  no  longer 
a  feeble  hope,  a  trembling  aspiration,  a  pleasing  hypothesis,  but  an 
assured  and  joyful  conviction.  In  its  clear  nlaylight,  the  hideous  Inquisi- 
tion, and  all  kindred  devxees  for  torturing  heretics,  under  a  libellous 
pretence  of  zeal  for  God.  shrink  and  cower  in  shame  and  terror;  the 
revolting  gallows  hides  itself  from  public  view,  preliminary  to  its  utter 
and  final  disappearance;  and  man,  growing  ashamed  of  all  cruelty  and 
revenge,  deals  humanely  with  tae  outcast,  the  pauper,  the  criminal,  and 
the  vanquished  foe.  The  overthrow  of  a  rebellion  is  no  longer  the  signal 
for  sweeping  spoliation  and  massacre;  the  downfall  of  an  ancient  tyranny 
like  that  of  Naples  is  followed  bv  ao  butchery  of  its  pertinacious  uphold- 
ers ;  and  our  earth  begins  to  body  forth  and  mirror  —  but  so  slowly,  so 
faintly!  —  the  merciful  doctrines  ot  the  meek  and  loving  Prince  of  Peace. 

"  Perhaps  I  ought  to  add,  that,  with  the  great  body  of  the  Universalists 
of  our  day  (who  herein  differ  from  the  earlier  pioneers  in  America  of  our 
faith),  I  believe  that  '  our  God  is  one  Lord,'  —  that '  though  there  be  that 
are  called  gods,  as  there  be  gods  man}'  and  lords  many,  to  us  there  is  but 
one  God,  the  Father,  of  whom  are  all  tilings,  one  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  fry  whom 
are  all  things;'  and  I  find  the  relation  between  the  Father  and  the  Saviour 
of  mankind  most  fully  and  clearly  set  forth  in  that  majestic  first  chapter 
of  Hebrews,  which  I  cannot  see  how  any  Trinitarian  can  ever  have 
intently  read,  without  perceiving  that  its  whole  tenour  and  burden  are 
directly  at  war  with  his  conception  of  '  three  persons  in  one  God.'  Nor 
can  1  see  how  Paul's  express  assertion,  that  '  when  all  things  shall  be 


A   YOTJNQ   POLITICIAN.  71 

subdued  unto  him,  then  shall  the  Son  himself  also  be  subject  to  Him  that 
put  all  things  under  him,  that -God  may  be  all  in  all,'  is  to  be  reconciled 
with  the  more  popular  creed.  However,  I  war  not  upon  others'  convic- 
tions, but  rest  satisfied  with  a  simple  statement  of  my  own." 

Most  American  citizens  of  the  rural  districts  are  active 
politicians.  They  have  a  good  deal  of  spare  time  on  their 
hands,  which,  as  a  rule,  they  spend  in  political  discussion; 
whereas  the  residents  of  cities  occupy  similar  hours,  in  which 
they  are  not  actively  engaged  in  business,  at  the  theatre,  social 
gatherings,  the  lecture  room,  the  meeting  for  this,  that,  or  the 
other  benevolent  object,  etc.,  etc.  It  is  probably  true  that 
nine-tenths  of  the  talk  among  the  male  citizens  of  the  coun- 
try, and  small  towns  and  cities  of  the  United  States,  would  be 
found  to  embrace  political  subjects  only:  the  conduct  of 
national,  State,  and  local  government;  the  partizan  issues  of 
the  day;  the  characters  of  representative  men,  and  cognate 
topics.  Horace  Greeley  was  an  eager  reader  of  everything  he 
could  get  to  read,  especially  newspapers,  from  early  childhood; 
and  he  frankly  admits  that  the  result  was,  he  was  an  ardent 
politician  before  he  was  half  old  enough  to  vote. 

It  is  a  noteworthy  fact  that  the  first  political  struggle  in 
which  his  sympathies  were  earnestly  enlisted  was  upon  the 
subject  of  slavery.  It  may  appear  singular  to  many  persons 
that  a  boy  only  eight  or  nine  years  old  should  take  hearty 
interest  in  a  topic  of  so.  grave  a  nature;  but  the  occasion 
which  brought  forth  a  national  agitation  of  the  subject  at  this 
time  was  the  proposed  admission  of  Missouri  into  the  Union 
as  a  slave  State,  a  measure  which  was  very  generally  regarded, 
perhaps,  throughout  the  North  as  politically  wrongful,  and  as 
foreboding  danger  to  the  republic.  It  was  discussed  at  every 
fireside;  by  every  journal;  by  every  public  speaker.  The 
pulpit  thundered  against  the  measure  as  involving  national 
immorality  and  a  turpitude  so  palpable  that  it  might  justly 
call  forth  the  indignation  of  Heaven.  When,  therefore,  we 
consider  the  nature  of  the  question,  of  American  rural  com- 
munities then  and  now,  and  that  they  were  unusually  agitated, 
it  will  not  be  considered  strange,  after  all,  that  a  boy  so 
singularly  observant,  intelligent,  and  thoughtful  beyond  his 


72  LIFE  OF  HORACE  OKEELEY. 

years  as  Horace  Greeley  should  have  both  reflected  and  talked 
a  good  deal  on  "  the  Missouri  Question."  He  became  an  ar- 
dent anti-slavery  boy  at  this  time;  and,  it  need  hardly  be  added, 
the  ardour  grew  with  years  and  failed  not  to  be  clearly  mani- 
fested until  the  final  triumph  of  Emancipation.  The  storm 
which  grew  out  of  this  question  of  the  admission  of  Missouri 
was  reduced  to  temporary  calm  by  the  famous  "  Compromise," 
whereby,  though  Missouri  was  admitted  as  a  slave  State, 
slavery  in  the  public  domain  lying  north  of  the  latitude  of 
thirty-six  degrees,  thirty  minutes, — the  parallel  of  the  southern 
boundary  of  the  State, — was  forever  prohibited.  We  shall 
hereafter  see  that  those  who  in  1819-20  denounced  the  Com- 
promise as  a  delusion,  and  as  a  mere  makeshift  measure  of 
postponement,  were  in  the  right.  Among  these  was  the  lad, 
Horace  Greeley.  The  administration  of  president  Monroe  has 
been  often  styled  an  "era  of  good  feeling."  He  had  been 
elected  to  the  second  term  without  opposition.  The  questions 
which  had,  in  the  early  history  of  the  nation,  divided  the  peo- 
ple into  parties  of  opposing  policies  and  dogmas,  had  been 
settled  in  favour  of  the  party  which  had  taken  the  name  of 
.Republican ;  and  it  was  not  long  after  the  close  of  our  last  war 
with  Great  Britain  that  the  political  organization  which  had 
opposed  it  passed  out  of  existence;  as  was  clearly  manifested 
by  the  last  election  of  Monroe.  Then  followed  for  a  brief 
period  after  the  recognized  era  of  good  feeling  what  may  be 
described  as  the  "Era  of  Personal-Preference  Parties."  In  the 
first  Presidential  contest  of  this  era,  that  of  1824,  young 
Greeley ,  now  a  lad  of  some  thirteen  summers,  but  already 
beginning  to  be  considered  a  sort  of  living  cyclopedia  of  poli 
tics  and  walking  embodiment  of  statistical  tables,  manifested 
an  intelligent  interest,  which,  had  political  knowledge  and 
judgment  been  the  test  of  franchise,  would  have  given  him 
better  title  to  vote  than  a  great  majority  of  voters.  During 
this  campaign  there  were  five  candidates  for  the  Presidency, 
namely,  John  Quincy  Adams,  William  H.  Crawford,  John  C. 
Calhoun,  Henry  Clay,  and  Andrew  Jackson.  Of  these,  the 
first  was  Secretary  of  State  in  President  Monroe's  cabinet;  the 
second,  Secretary  of  the  Treasury;  the  third,  Secretary  of  War; 


'    A   YOUNG    POLITICIAN.  73 

the  fourth,  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Representatives;  the  fifth, 
the  "hero  of  New  Orleans."  Mr.  Calhoun  withdrew  as  a 
presidential  candidate,  before  election.  To  show  how  entirely 
obliterated  were  party  lines,  so  far  as  concerned  distinct  meas- 
ures of  national  polity,  it  is  only  necessary  to  state  that  each 
of  the  candidates  cordially  sustained  the  general  measures  of 
the  administration.  Our  living  cyclopedia  of  politics  sympa- 
thized with  New  England,  and  preferred  Mr.  Adams.  It  is 
well  known  that  the  States  failed  to  elect  through  the  electoral 
college,  and  that  the  House  of  Representatives,  voting  by 
States,  chose  Mr.  Adams  President. 

In  the  next  Presidential  campaign,  young  Greeley,  at  this 
time  an  apprentice  in  the  office  of  a  journal  which  espoused 
the  Adams  cause,  took  a  still  greater  interest.  There  had 
been  as  yet  no  national  convention — an  invention  not  made 
until  som6  years  afterwards — publishing  proclamation  of  plat- 
form. Citizens  still  divided  themselves  into  "Adams  men" 
on  the  one  side  and  "Jackson  men"  on  the  other;  an  exceed- 
ingly convenient  nomenclature,  since  it  allowed  the  adherents 
of  either  candidate  to  advocate  such  veiws  as  might  be  popular 
in  their  respective  localities.  And  by  this  time  those  ques- 
tions of  domestic  policy,  which  afterwards  formed  the  issues, — 
though  not  always  honestly  and  distinctly  drawn, — between 
the  parties  which  adopted  the  names  of  Democratic  and  Whig 
had  begun  to  be  discussed  by  the  people. 

This  was  also  the  period  of  a  singular  episode  in  American 
politics.  One  Morgan,  a  printer  and  publisher,  had  published 
a  book  professing  to  expose  the  secrets  of  the  order  of  Free 
Masons.  Curiosity  caused  a  large  demand  for  the  book,  and 
Morgan  concluded  to  put  monej  in  his  purse  by  publishing 
another,  which,  it  was  announced,  would  reveal  a  terrible  state 
of  things,  showing  that  Free  Masonry  was  a  great  enormity. 
But  before  this  book  appeared,  Mr.  Morgan  disappeared. 
Whereupon  it  was  alleged  that  he  had  been  secretly  made  way 
with  by  the  Free  Masons!  It  is  difficult  to  imagine  the  ex- 
citement which  grew  out  of  this  affair  all  over  the  North  and 
West.  "Anti-Masonry"  became  much  of  a  social  frenzy  and 
was  especially  strong  in  the  State  of  Yermont.  It  is  not  won- 


74  LIFE   OF   nORACE  GKEELEY. 

derful,  therefore,  that  young  Greeley  became  an  ardent  "  anti 
Mason."  So  strongly,  indeed,  were  his  feelings  wrought  up 
by  the  contagious  frenzy,  that  he  remained  an  opponent  of 
eecret  societies  during  his  lifetime.  It  may  not  be  out  of 
place  to  say  here  that  in  1831,  an  "anti-Mason"  national  con- 
vention was  held,  at  Baltimore,  which  upon  this  issue  nomi- 
nated the  distinguished  William  Wirt  for  the  Presidency.  In 
the  election  of  the  following  year  he  carried  only  the  State  of 
Vermont,  casting  seven  electoral  votes. 

This  singular  political  issue,  as  it  came  to  be  in  1832,  had 
much  influence,  doubtless,  in  the  campaign  of  1828,  when 
parties  as  yet  had  no  general  name,  but,  as  we  have  seen,  the 
supporters  of  the  two  Presidential  candidates  passed  by  the  name 
of  "Adams  men"  and  "Jackson  men"  respectively.  General 
Jackson  was  successful,  by  a  large  majority  of  both  popular 
and  electoral  votes,  to  the  great  regret  of  OUT  apprentice  at 
Poultney. 

During  the  period  in  which  Horace  Greeley  had  now  taken 
an  intelligent  interest  in  politics,  Henry  Clay  had  made  a 
number  of  his  most  brilliant  speeches,  had  been  Secretary  oi 
State  under  President  John  Quincy  Adams,  and  had  become 
the  most  distinguished  advocate,  perhaps,  of  a  system  of  in- 
ternal improvements  by  appropriations  from  the  federal  treas- 
ury; of  a  National  Bank;  of  the  protection  of  American 
manufactures  by  means  of  high  customs  duties  upon  imported 
merchandise.  He  was  also  believed  to  be  hostile  to  slavery, 
and  was  quite  generally  regarded  throughout  the  North  as  an 
earnest  enemy  of  its  extension.  The  anti-Jackson  men,  now 
called  "  National  Republicans," — as  their  opponents  began  to 
be  called  " Democrats,"  usually  with  a  "Jackson"  prefix, — 
nominated  Mr.  Clay  for  the  Presidency.  Horace  Greeley's 
"anti-Masonry"  was  not  so  strong  as  "his  National  Republic- 
anism, and  he  laboured  and  voted  for  "Harry  of  the  West" 
with  the  greatest  zeal.  The  political  opinions  and  the  personal 
admiration  manifested  by  his  first  vote  were  a  part  of  himself, 
— and,  many  will  think,  not  the  most  admirable  part, — till  the 
day  of  his  death.  His  intense  admiration  of  a  statesman  so 
superficial  as  Henry  Clay  cannot  but  be  regarded  by  many  as 


ADMIRATION   OF   HENRY   CLAY.  75 

one  of  his  most  amiable  and  imphilosophical  characteristics, 
lie  was  deeply  chagrinned  at  the  success  of  General  Jackson, 
whose  sterling  qualities  he  never  learned  fully  to  appreciate; 
but  by  the  beginning  of  the  following  year  was  able  to  under- 
take to  carry  on  a  printing  office  on  his  own  account,  with 
cheerfulness  and  confidence. 


JAMES  GORDON  BENNETT.— See  pages  107,  etc. 


CHAPTEE   V. 

BUSINESS  VENTURES  IN  NEW- YORK 

Partnership  with  Francis  V.  Story — A  Bank  Note  Reporter  and  The 
Morning  Post  —  Failure  of  the  Penny  Daily  —  Dr.  Shepard  —  Mr. 
SciUris — Weathering  the  Storm  —  Partner  Drowned  in  East  River  — 
Mi.  Jonas  Winchester,  next  Partner  —  The  New-Yorker  —  The  City 
Political  C.'ontest  of  1834  —  Prints  and  Partially  Edits  a  Campaign 
Paper — A  "Grahamite"  Boarding -House  —  Marriage  —  Clay,  Cal- 
houo,  (MUenden  —  Severe  Struggle  with  the  Hard  Times  of  1837  — 
The  JNew-  Yorker  Continued,  though  Burdened  by  Debt  —  Finally  It 
Gotis  Uj)  in  Flame  and  Smoke. 

THE  st.ropfj  of  circumstances  had  driven  Horace  Greeley  to 
New- York  a  year  or  two  sooner  than  he  would  have  made  the 
venture  had  he  heen  in  a  more  independent  situation.  He 
tells  us  tliut  he  was  in  like  manner  impelled  to  undertake  the 
responsibilities  of  business  sooner  than  he  otherwise  would 
have  dune.  For,  when  he  went  into  business,  he  was  not  yet 
twenty-two  years  of  age,  and  the  amount  of  his  savings  was 
very  small,  notwithstanding  his  economical  habits;  all  the 
smaller,  because  he  had  constantly  remitted  generous  propor- 
tions to  his  father  to  aid  him  in  his  struggles  with  the 
stubborn  wilderness.  Though  Mr.  Greeley  had  improved 
upon  his  original  rustic  ways  and  "outlandish  get-up,"  he 
was  still  an  awkward,  bashful  young  man,  and  as  odd  a  looking 
specimen,  for  business  in  the  great  city,  as,  perhaps,  the  metro- 
polis ever  saw  withal. 

But  he  had  great  affection  for  and  confidence  in  his  friend 
and  fellow-workman,  Mr.  Francis  V.  Story,  who,  though  littlo 
older  than  himself,  had  also  been  accustomed  to  struggling 
with  difficulties,  was  well  acquainted  with  city  ways,  was  of  a 
hopeful,  buoyant  nature,  and  enterprising  spirit.  He  appears 
to  have  happily  appreciated  Greeley  from  the  beginning  of 
their  acquaintance.  He  had  for  some  time  purposed  to  start 

(70) 


FIRST   BUSINESS   VENTURE.  77 

a  small  printing  establishment,  and,  determining  to  do  so  late 
in  the  year  1832,  offered  his  friend  a  partnership  in  the 
proposed  concern.  The  arguments  in  favour  of  the  enterprise 
briefly  were:  Mr.  Story's  position  on  the  Spirit  of  the  Times 
had  made  him  well  acquainted  with  Mr.  S.  J.  Sylvester,  at  the 
time  a  leading  broker  of  Wall  street,  and  seller  of  lottery- 
tickets,  who  issued  a  weekly  "  Bank-Note  Reporter,"  and  who 
offered  Story  the  job  of  printing  that  publication.  Here  was 
a  certainty  of  some  regular  income.  Story  had  also  become 
acquainted  with  Dr.  H.  D.  Shepard,  a  recent  graduate,  under- 
stood to  be  possessed  of  money  and  an  idea  then  novel, 
namely,  the  publication  of  a  cheap  daily  paper  to  be  sold 
about  the  streets.  In  this  idea  Story  became  a  believer,  and 
urged  Greeley  to  unite  with  him  on  the  strength  of  Mr. 
Sylvester's  and  Dr.  Shepard 's  proffered  work.  Mr.  Greeley 
hesitated,  but  at  length  entered  into  the  arrangement,  and  the 
partners  hired  part  of  two  rooms  on  the  southwest  corner  of 
Nassau  and  Liberty  streets  (opposite  the  present  city  Post 
Office),  and  the  house  of  Story  &  Greeley,  Printers,  was 
established. 

It  was  an  establishment  of  humble  pretensions.  The  "little 
all,"  in  cash  "capital"  of  the  partners  consisted  of  less  than 
two  hundred  dollars,  and  they  were  compelled  to  stretch  their 
credit  to  the  utmost  for  the  requisite  materials.  As  illustra- 
ting the  embarrassments  under  which  the  new  firm  was  started 
into  business,  the  following  incident,  related  by  Mr.  Greeley, 
will  be  found  interesting  and  instructive: 

"  I  tried  Mr.  James  Conner,  the  extensive  type-founder  in  Ann  Street, — 
having  a  very  slight  acquaintance  with  him,  formed  in  the  course  of  fre- 
quent visits  to  his  foundry  in  quest  of  '  sorts '  (type  found  deficient  in  the 
several  offices  for  which  I  had  worked  at  one  time  or  another), — but  he, 
after  hearing  me  patiently,  decided  not  to  credit  me  six  months  for  the  |40 
worth  of  type  I  wanted  of  him;  and  he  did  right, — my  exhibit  did  not 
justify  my  request.  I  went  directly  thence  to  Mr.  George  Bruce,  the  older 
and  wealthier  founder,  in  Chambers  Street, — made  the  same  exhibit,  and 
was  allowed  by  him  the  credit  I  asked;  and  that  purchase  has  since 
secured  to  his  concern  the  sale  of  not  less  than  $50,000  worth  of  type.  I 
think  he  must  have  noted  something  in  my  awkward,  bashful  ways,  that 
impelled  him  to  take  the  risk." 


78  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELET. 

The  first  notable  job  printed  by  Story  &  Greeley  was  The 
Morning  Post  newspaper,  of  which  Dr.  Shepard  was  editor 
and  publisher.  It  appeared  on  the  morning  of  January  1, 
1833.  It  had  not  been  advertised  at  all.  The  day  was  an 
unfortunate  one  for  such  a  venture,  few  people  in  New- York 
then  or  since  caring  to  read  much  on  New  Year's  day. 
Moreover,  the  weather  was  extremely  cold,  and  the  streets 
were  almost  blockaded  by  a  heavy  fall  of  snow  the  previous 
night.  And  so  the  sales  of  The  Morning  Post  and  the  mer- 
cury in  the  thermometers  were  very  little  above  zero.  The 
price  of  the  paper  was  two  cents.  It  was  afterwards  reduced 
to  one  cent,  and  is  said  to  have  been  the  first  penny  paper  in 
the  world.  It  soon  transpired  that  Dr.  Shepard  was  without 
means,  being  barely  able  to  meet  the  expenses  of  the  concern 
for  a  single  week.  It  was  not  well  edited,  had  no  reporters 
worth  mentioning,  no  correspondents,  and  attained  a  circula- 
tion of  only  a  few  hundred  copies.  The  publisher  having 
stopped  payment  after  the  first  week  or  so,  the  printers  were 
able  to  keep  it  going  but  a  short  time  afterwards.  And  "  thus 
the  first  cheap-for-cash  daily  in  New- York — perhaps  in  the 
world — died  when  scarcely  yet  a  month  old;  and  the  printers 
were  hard  aground  on  a  lee  shore,  with  little  prospect  of 
getting  off."  But  the  seed  was  thus  sown,  after  all,  which 
subsequently  grew  and  bore  rich  fruit.1 

1  It  would  appear  from  certain  expressions  in  Mr.  Greeley's  "  Recollec- 
tions," that  he  at  no  time  had  confidence  in  the  success  of  this  venture, 
and  for  the  reason  that  cheapness  was  about  the  only  thing  of  the  paper 
calculated  to  be  popular.  It  is  doubtless  true,  considering  his  inexperience 
and  want  of  means,  that  Dr.  Shepard's  experiment  was  injudicious,  rash. 
But  he  deserves  credit  for  the  idea  and  the  pertinacity  with  which  he 
adhered  to  it,  until  newspapers  were  actually  sold  on  the  streets  every 
morning  for  a  single  penny  apiece.  Mr.  Frederic  Hudson,  in  his 
"History  of  Journalism"  speaking  of  this  experiment,  says  it  "was  the 
seed  of  the  Cheap  Press.  It  had  taken  root."  In  a  few  months,  The  Sun 
followed,  and  soon  attained  an  immense  circulation  and  made  great  profits. 
Mr.  Greeley  once  said,  "in  that  slouching  Whig  defeat  of  1836  lay  the 
germ  of  the  overwhelming  Whig  triumph  of  1840."  Thus  it  was  with  the 
failure  of  The  Morning  Post.  That  failure  was  attributable,  not  to  the 
impracticability  of  the  idea,  but  to  unfortunate  circumstances.  Dr. 
Shepard,  therefore,  may  be  fairly  considered  as  entitled  to  the  credit  and 
renown  of  having  been  the  originator  of  the  Modern  Cheap  Press. 


HIS  FOOT  JOURNAL.  79 

Messrs.  Story  &  Greeley  were  saved  from  sudden  bank- 
ruptcy, as  one  of  the  natural  consequences  of  the  collapse  of 
The  Morning  Post  by  the  address  of  the  senior  partner.  Mr. 
Story  was  well  acquainted  with  a  wealthy,  eccentric  Briton, 
named  Schols,  who  had  a  taste  for  editorial  life,  and  who  was 
induced  to  buy  the  wreck  of  the  paper,  remove  it  to  an  office 
of  his  own,  and  employ  Story  as  foreman.  He  soon  tired  of 
the  bargain  and  threw  it  up ;  but  meantime  the  embarass- 
ments  of  the  firm  had  been  overcome;  the  managers  of  the 
New-York  lotteries  had  allowed  a  portion  of  their  letter-press 
printing  to  follow  Mr.  Sylvester's  into  their  concern;  Mr. 
Greeley  was  frequently  employed  as  a  substitute  in  the  com- 
posing room  of  The  Commercial  Advertiser;  jobs,  sharply 
looked  after,  began  to  come  in  quite  satisfactorily;  and  the 
young  men  were  begining  to  make  decided  headway,  when. 
Mr.  Story  was  drowned  (July  9,  1833)  while  bathing  in  the 
East  River,  near  his  mother's  residence  in  Brooklyn. 

Mr.  Greeley  deeply  mourned  the  loss  of  his  "  nearest  and 
dearest  friend."  A  satisfactory  arrangement  was  at  onco 
made  with  Mr.  Story's  mother,  who  received  half  the  accounts 
due  the  firm,  while  another  young  printer,  Mr.  Jonas  Win- 
chester, who  soon  married  Mr.  Story's  oldest  sister,  became 
Mr.  Greeley's  partner.  The  new  firm  went  on  with  moderate 
but  steady  prosperity,  satisfied  with  the  work  they  received 
from  others,  and  not  making  any  journalistic  venture  of  their 
own  until  the  Spring  of  1834.  On  the  22d  day  of  March  of 
that  year  The  New-Yorker  appeared, — a  weekly  journal  of 
large  size,  mainly  devoted  to  current  literature,  but  giving 
every  week  a  carefully-edited  summary  of  news,  with,  from 
time  to  time,  full  exhibits  of  election  returns,  and  an  impar- 
tial digest  of  political  intelligence.  The  New-Yorker  was  at 
first  folio  in  form,  but  was  afterwards  changed  to  a  double 
quarto. 

This  may  be  properly  considered  the  first  venture  in  jour- 
nalism of  Horace  Greeley.  He  edited  and  made  up  the  paper, 
Mr.  Winchester  having  charge  of  the  more  profitable  jobbing 
business  of  the  firm.  The  journal  appeared  without  having 
been  previously  advertised  and  with  less  than  a  score  of  sub- 


80  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GREELEY. 

scribers.     Its  prospectus,  under  the  heading  of  "The  Publish- 
ers Address"  was  as  follows: 

"There  is  one  disadvantage  attending  our  debut  which  is  seldom  encoun- 
tered in  the  outset  of  periodicals  aspiring  to  general  popularity  and 
patronage.  Ours  is  not  blazoned  through  the  land  as,  'The  Cheapest 
Periodical  in  the  World,'  'The  Largest  Paper  ever  Published,'  or  any  of 
the  captivating  clap-traps  wherewith  enterprising  gentlemen,  possessed  of 
a  convenient  stock  of  assurance,  are  wont  to  usher  in  their  successive 
experiments  on  the  gullibility  of  the  Public.  No  likenesses  of  eminent 
and  favourite  authors  will  embellish  our  title,  while  they  disdain  to  write 
for  our  columns.  No 'distinguished  literary  and  fashionable  characters' 
have  been  dragged  in  to  bolster  up  a  rigmarole  of  preposterous  and 
charlatan  pretensions.  And  indeed  so  serious  is  this  deficiency,  that  the 
first  (we  may  say  the  only)  objection  which  has  been  started  by  our  most 
judicious  friends  in  the  discussion  of  our  plans  and  prospects,  has  invari- 
ably been  this:  —  'You  do  not  indulge  sufficiently  in  high-sounding 
pretensions.  You  cannot  succeed  without  humbug.'  Our  answer  baa 
constantly  been:  —  'We  shall  try,'  and  in  the  spirit  of  this  determination, 
we  respectfully  solicit  of  our  fellow-citizens  the  extension  of  that  share  of 
patronage  which  they  shall  deem  warranted  by  our  performances  rather 
than  our  promises." 

Horace  Greeley  wrote  the  editorials  and  made  the  selections 
for  The  New-Yorker  for  seven  years  and  a  half,  when  it  was 
discontinued.  Its  circulation  steadily  increased  from  the 
beginning  until  it  reached  nearly  ten  thousand.  Mr.  Parton 
says,  "The  New-Yorker  was,  incomparably,  the  best  news- 
paper of  its  kind  that  had  ever  been  published  in  this  country;" 
and  Mr.  Greeley  said,  more  than  a  quarter  of  a  century  after  its 
discontinuance  :  "  I  believe  that  just  such  a  paper,  issued  to- 
day, properly  published  and  advertised,  would  obtain  a  circu- 
lation of  one  hundred  thousand  in  less  time  than  was  required 
to  give  The  New-Yorker  scarcely  a  tithe  of  that  aggregate, 
and  would  make  money  for  its  owners,  instead  of  nearly 
starving  them,  as  mine  did."  The  paper  was  ably  and  very 
carefully  edited,  and  was  made  up  of  literary  matter,  judi- 
ciously selected  from  home  and  foreign  publications ;  editorials ; 
general  news,  with  special  excellency  as  to  current  political 
intelligence;  literary,  city,  and  miscellaneous  paragraphs.  It 
was  entirely  non-partizan  in  character,  but  the  accuracy  and 
fullness  of  its  political  news  soon  made  it  an  authority  in 


NOT  A    POET.  81 

respect  to  recent  and  current  political  events,  and  particularly 
the  exact  results  of  elections  in  all  the  States  of  the  Union. 

In  addition  to  the  writing  done  on  The  New-Yorker  during 
the  iirst  year  of  its  existence,  Mr.  Greeley  freely  contributed 
to  the  columns  of  a  daily  campaign  penny  paper,  entitled  The 
Constitution,  which  was  printed  by  his  firm,  but  the  editor 
and  publisher  of  which  was  Mr.  A.  R  Grain.  The  political 
canvass  of  that  year,  though  "  the  off  year "  in  general 
politics,  was  exceedingly  animated  in  the  city  of  New- York, 
and  resulted,  after  the  most  exciting  election  of  years,  in  a 
drawn  battle,  the  Democrats  electing  their  Mayor, — Cornelius 
W.  Lawrence  defeating  Gulian  C.  Verplanck  by  384  majority, — 
and  the  Whigs  a  majority  of  the  Common  Council.  Tho 
Constitution  did  not  pay,  and  Greeley  and  Winchester  were 
among  the  losers,  when  it  stopped. 

The  rudimentary  knowledge  of  the  art  of  composition 
acquired  by  Horace  Greeley  during  the  latter  part  of  his 
apprenticeship  was  gradually  improved  during  his  experience 
as  a  journeyman  in  various  offices,  and  afterward  as  a  printer 
of  the  experimental  Morning  Post,  and  other  papers.  For  a 
considerable  period  he  even  aspired  to  be  a  poet,  but  most 
ingenuously  confesses  that  his  genius  did  not  reach  far  in  that 
direction.  He  says:  "I  had  even  written  verses,  —  never 
fluently  nor  happily,  —  but  tolerably  well  measured,  and 
faintly  evincing  an  admiration  of  Byron,  Mrs.  Hemans,  and 
other  popular  writers,  —  an  admiration  which  I  never  mistook 
for  inspiration  or  genius.  While  true  poets  are  few,  those 
who  imagine  themselves  capable  of  becoming  such  are  many; 
but  I  never  advanced  even  to  this  grade.  I  knew  that  my 
power  of  expression  in  verse  was  defective,  as  though  I  had  an 
impediment  in  my  speech,  or  spoke  with  my  mouth  full  of 
pebbles ;  and  I  very  soon  renounced  the  fetters  of  verse,  con- 
tent to  utter  my  thoughts  thenceforth  in  unmistakable  prose. 
It  is  a  comfort  to  know  that  not  many  survive  who  remember 
having  read  any  of  the  few  rhymed  effusions  of  my  incautious 
youth."  It  is  so  seldom,  if  not  unique,  for  one  to  pronounce 
so  just,  though  unfavourable,  a  judgment  upon  his  own 
productions,  and  those  productions  in  verse,  that  it  ought 
6 


82  LITE   OF  HORACE  GKEELET. 

to  be  allowed  to  stand,  forever  undisturbed  and  faithfully 
respected. 

More  than  two  years  before  the  establishment  of  The  New- 
Yorker,  Dr.  Sylvester  Graham,  a  man  of  strong  and  acute 
mind,  and  unusually  well  informed  in  respect  of  the  human 
anatomy,  delivered  a  series  of  lectures  in  the  city,  advocating 
a  new  system  of  diet.  He  believed  that  health  is  the  necessary 
result  of  obedience,  disease,  of  disobedience  to  physical  laws; 
that  all  stimulants,  of  whatsoever  nature,  are  unwholesome, 
injurious;  that  spices  and  condiments  are  to  be  placed  in  the 
same  category;  that  better  food  than  the  flesh  of  animals  can 
almost  always  be  procured,  and  is  far  preferable.  He  also 
believed  that  food,  otherwise  good,  might  be  made  too  con- 
centrated to  be  wholesome;  and  he,  therefore,  advocated  the 
use  of  unbolted  flour  in  the  making  of  all  bread.  The  Doctor 
converted  a  considerable  number  to  the  adoption  of  "the 
Graham  system,"  and  Horace  Greeley  gave  it  his  general 
assent,  though  he  did  not  then,  nor  ever  afterwards,  wholly 
reject  the  use  of  meat,  or  tea  —  "  when  black  and  very  good." 

A  boarding-house  upon  the  Graham  system  was  established, 
and  hither  Mr.  Greeley  betook  himself  with  his  baggage. 
Here  he  became  acquainted  with  Miss  Mary  Y.  Cheney,  a 
teacher,  a  young  lady  of  accomplishments  and  culture,  and  a 
radical  "  Grahamite."  She  afterwards  removed  to  Warrenton, 
North  Carolina,  whence  the  acquaintance  with  Mr.  Greeley 
was  continued  by  correspondence.  In  consequence  whereof, 
The  New-Yorker  of  July  16,  1836,  at  the  head  of  its  list  of 
marriages,  contained  the  following: 

"  In  Imraanuel  church,  "Warrenton,  North  Carolina,  on  Tuesday  morn- 
ing, 5th  inst.,  by  Rev.  William  Norwood,  Mr.  HORACE  GREELET,  editor  of 
The  New-Yorker,  to  Miss  MART  Y.  CHENEY,  of  Warrenton,  formerly  of 
this  city." 

The  marriage  was  according  to  the  Episcopal  ceremony; 
and  on  this  occasion,  at  any  rate,  Horace  Greeley  was  dressed 
in  a  manner  which  would  have  satisfied  the  taste  of  the  most 
fastidious  gentleman.  On  returning  with  his  bride  to  New- 
York,  he  stopped  for  a  brief  visit  in  "Washington.  He  wag 


LAST  OF  THE   NEW-YORKER.  83 

profoundly  impressed  with  the  Senate,  thinking  it  unsurpassed 
in  intellectual  greatness  by  any  body  of  fifty  men  ever  con- 
vened. He  thought  Mr.  Clay  was  the  most  striking  person 
on  the  floor,  and  Mr.  Calhoun  one  of  the  plainest.  Daniel 
Webster  he  did  not  see;  but  predicted  great  distinction  for 
Mr.  Crittenden. 

At  the  time  of  his  marriage,  Mr.  Greeley  considered  himself 
worth  five  thousand  dollars,  and  the  master  of  a  business 
which,  with  his  labour,  would  yield  him  at  least  one  thousand 
dollars  annually, — a  sum  sufficient  for  the  respectable  support 
of  a  small  family  in  those  days.  About  this  time  he  dissolved 
partnership  with  Mr.  Winchester,  who  took  the  job  depart- 
ment of  the  establishment,  he,  The  New-Yorker  ofiice.  His 
anticipations  of  income  proved  to  be  sadly  at  fault.  The 
financial  crash  of  1837  brought  him  to  the  verge  of  ruin  and 
involved  him  deeply  in  debt.  Throughout  the  year  he  found 
himself  compelled  to  confront  a  net  loss  of  about  one  hundred 
dollars  per  week.  He  constantly  and  vigourously  appealed  to 
his  delinquent  subscribers,  but  all  in  vain.  As  a  rule,  they 
were  as  badly  broken  as  he  was.  And  so,  oppressed  by  debt, 
he  struggled  on,  hoping  against  hope,  and  fighting  bravely 
to  the  last,  uniil  after  he  had  founded  that  great  daily  journal 
by  which  his  name  shall  be  lastingly  perpetuated,  and,  no 
doubt,  his  beneficent  influence  continued  evermore. 

The  final  discontinuance  of  The  New-Yorker  is  thus 
described  by  himself: 

"When  I  at  length  stopped  The  New-Yorker  (September  20,  1841), 
though  poor  enough,  I  provided  for  making  good  all  I  owed  to  its 
subscribers  who  had  paid  in  advance,  and  shut  up  its  books  whereon  were 
inscribed  some  $10,000  owed  me  in  sums  of  $1  to  $10  each,  by  men  to 
whose  service  I  had  faithfully  devoted  the  best  years  of  my  life,  —  years 
that,  though  full  of  labour  and  frugal  care,  might  have  been  happy  had 
they  not  been  made  wretched  by  those  men's  dishonesty.  They  took  my 
journal,  and  probably  read  it;  they  promised  to  pay  for  it,  and  defaulted; 
leaving  me  to  pay  my  paper-maker,  type-founder,  journeymen,  etc.,  as  I 
could.  My  only  requital  was  a  sorely  achieved  but  wholesome  lesson.  I 
had  been  thoroughly  burned  out,  only  saving  my  books,  in  the  great  Ann 
Street  fire  (August  12,  1835);  I  was  burned  out  again  in  February,  1845; 
and,  while  the  destruction  was  complete,  and  the  insurance  but  partial,  I 
had  the  poor  consolation,  that  the  account-books  of  The  New-Yorker  — 


8*  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

which  I  had  never  opened  since  I  first  laid  them  away,  but  which  had 
been  an  eye-sore  and  a  reminder  of  evil  days  whenever  I  stumbled  upon 
them  —  were  at  length  dissolved  in  smoke  and  flame,  and  lost  to  sight 
for  ever."  * 

Meanwhile,  before  The  New-Yorker  stopped,  events  of  vast 
importance  had  transpired  in  the  State  and  Nation,  with  the 
bringing  about  of  which  Horace  Greeley  had  had  much  to  do. 
It  is  fit,  therefore,  that  we  should  now  glance  at  the  political 
history  of  this  period,  that  we  may  justly  estimate  his  influence 
upon  his  cotemporaries,  and  correctly  note  the  impress  of  his 
mind  upon  his  times. 

*  Roeoli«*tion!»,  p.  97. 


HENRY  J.  RAYMOND.— See  pages  120,  etc. 


CHATTEL    VI. 

CHIEFLY  OF  THE  "LOG-CABIN"  CAMPAIGN. 

Tlit  Presidential  Election  of  1836— "  Old  Hickory"—  Grcclcy's  Opinion  of 
Martin  Van  Buren —  Thurlow  "Weed  Calls  on  Mr.  Grceloy — The  Latter 
Induced  to  Take  Charge  of  a  "Campaign"  Paper  at  Albany — The 
Jeffersonian — A  Model  Political  "Organ" — The  Graves  and  Cilley 
Duel — Success  to  the  Whigs  in  New  York  State  —  William  II.  Seward 
Elected  Governor — The  Remarkable  Presidential  Campaign  of  1840 
— The  Harrisburgh  Convention — Nomination  of  General  Harrison 
—  "Tippecanoe  and  Tyler  Too"  —  Log-Cabins  and  Hard  Cider — Mr. 
Greeley  Edits  The  Log-Cabin  Newspaper — Its  Character — Prodigious 
Success — The  Nation  Aroused  —  Notices  of  Some  of  The  Most  Noted 
Orators — Triumph — The  Death  of  President  Harrison  —  Mr.  Grceloy 
Determines  to  Establish  a  Daily  Journal  in  New-  York. 

THE  second  election  of  Andrew  Jackson  was  followed  by 
"  good  times  "  throughout  the  country.  The  National  Banks 
had  been  overturned.  The  Federal  revenue  was  deposited  in 
State  banks  ("the  Pet  Banks,"  as  they  were  called  by  the 
Whigs),  which  had  thereby  been  enabled  to  make  a  great 
expansion  of  issues  and  loans,  flooding  the  country  with  cur- 
rency. Prices  were  high;  speculation  was  rife;  money,  such 
as  it  was,  abounded  plentifully;  there  was  great  demand  for 
labour;  there  was,  in  fine,  a  tidal  wave  of  universal  prosperity 
sweeping  over  the  country.  And  for  all  this,  "  Old  Hickory," 
as  President  Jackson  was  generally  called,  was  given  the  credit. 
He  became  the  autocrat  of  the  dominating  party;  dictating  its 
policy,  nominating  its  candidates,  and  bearing  them  on  to 
success  by  the  strength  of  his  mighty  name.  There  never  has 
been  an  American  President  so  preposterously  praised  and  so 
cruelly  abused  as  Andrew  Jackson.  He  was  illiterate,  un- 
genteelly  profane,  a  swaggerer,  a  bully,  a  duellist,  and  a 
bigamist.  Such  were  among  the  mildest  descriptions  by  his 
opponents.  Decency  could  not  endure  the  pictures  of  him  as 
painted  by  the  pot-house  politicians  of  the  opposition.  On 

(85) 


86  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

the  other  hand,  he  was  represented  by  Jus  friends  as  the  second 
father  and  saviour  of  his  country.  No  praise  of  him  could  be 
too  highly  drawn;  no  eulogium  too  extravagant.  In  truth,  he 
was  a  man  of  great  good  sense,  of  wonderfully  correct  intui- 
tions as  to  the  wishes  of  the  people,  of  magnificent  pluck,  and 
of  invincible  will.  He  was  a  first-rate  hater  of  his  enemies, 
and  a  most  chivalrously  devoted  friend. 

Circumstances  of  a  peculiar  nature  had  made  President 
Jackson  not  only  the  friend  but  the  patron  of  Martin  Yan 
Buren.  The  President  willed  that  Van  Buren  should  be  his 
successor;  and  he  was.  Mr.  Yan  Buren  was  not  the  nominee 
of  the  Democratic  party,  but  of  Andrew  Jackson,  and  as  such 
was  undoubtedly  stronger  than  if  he  had  been  nominated  by 
an  untrammelled  national  convention.  Richard  M;  Jolmsoi , 
of  Kentucky,  was  nominated  for  Yice-President.  The  Whigs, 
without  any  caucus  or  convention,  ran  General  Harrison  for 
President  and  Francis  Granger  for  Yice-President.  An  inde- 
pendent ticket,  consisting  of  Hugh  L.  "White,  of  Tennessee, 
and  John  Tyler,  of  Virginia,  contested  the  South  with  the 
regulars  of  the  Jackson  party.  The  result  developed  unex- 
pected strength  on  the  part  of  the  Whigs,  who  carried 
Vermont,  New  Jersey,  Delaware,  Maryland,  Ohio,  Indiana,  and 
Kentucky,  losing  Pennsylvania  by  a  very  small  majority,  while 
two  Southern  States  voted  for  White,  and,  in  addition,  Virginia 
refused  to  vote  for  Johnson,  BO  that  he  had  to  be  chosen  Vice- 
President  by  the  Senate. 

Mr.  Greeley  had  ardently  supported  the  candidacy  of  General 
Harrison,  but  was  therein  seconded  by  very  few  politicians  in 
the  East.    The  result  vindicated  his  judgment,  and  demon 
strated  the  fact  that  Harrison  either  was  more  popular  or  Van 
Buren  more  obnoxious  than  had  been  commonly  supposed.1 

'The  election  of  Van  Buren  was  extremely  distasteful  to  Mr.  Greeley, 
who  seems  to  have  had  anything  but  an  exalted  opinion  of  "the  Sage  of 
Kinderhook."  He  says,  in  his  "  Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life :" 

"  Mr.  Van  Buren's  election  to  the  Presidency  always  seemed  to  m« 
anomalous,  and  I  am  not  yet  fully  reconciled  to  it.  He  had  none  of  that 
personal  magnetism  which  made  General  Jackson  and  Mr.  Clay  respect- 
ively the  idols  of  their  contending  parties.  He  was  not  even  an  orator, 
was  far  inferior  to  Silas  Wright  as  a  debater,  and  to  William  L.  Marcy  in 


MR.    THURLOW    WEED.  87 

The  Whigs  drew  great  encouragement  for  the  future  from  the 
result,  and  those  of  New  York  especially  set  themselves  imme- 
diately to  work  with  a  confidence  of  success  which  had  not 
before  been  felt  in  anti-Jackson  circles. 

The  financial  revulsion  which  speedily  followed  the  inauga- 
ration  of  President  Yan  Buren,  making  1837  the  "black year" 
in  American  business  annals,  was  the  precursor  of  a  political 
revolution  without  parallel  in  the  history  of  politics  in  the 
United  States.  The  elections  of  the  year  all  showed  an  aston- 
ishing change  of  party  affiliations.  In.  New  York,  the 
President's  own  State,  he  hardly  had  any  one  left  to  say  "  God 
bless  him."  The  Whigs  for  the  first  time  earned  the  city  of 
New- York.  Out  of  128  members  of  assembly,  they  carried  no 
less  than  one  hundred.  The  Senate,  only  one-fourth  of  which 
was  chosen  annually,  remained,  of  course,  strongly  Democratic. 
The  next  year  a  Governor  would  have  to  be  chosen ;  the  Legis- 
lature would  by  law  be  required  to  elect  a  United  States 
Senator;  Representatives  in  Congress  would  also  be  elected. 
It  was  a  vital  matter  that  the  campaign  of  the  year  should  be 
conducted  with  judgment  and  vigour  "  all  along  the  lines." 

Mr.  Thurlow  Weed,  at  this  time  the  editor  of  The  Albany 
Evening  Journal,  was  the  Warwick  of  New  York  politics;  or, 
rather,  it  should  be  said,  of  the  Whig  party  in  that  common- 
wealth. We  have  never  had  in  America,  perhaps,  a  private 
citizen  who  exercised  so  much  influence  in  partisan  afiairs  as 
this  gentleman;  and  there  have  been  but  few  men  in  the  re- 
public, no  matter  how  exalted  in  official  position,  who  have  in 
reality  wielded  greater  political  power  than  he.  He  has  dic- 
tated platforms  and  nominated  candidates.  He  has  controlled 
the  policy  of  our  greatest  State,  and  at  important  crises 
marked  out  the  polity  of  the  national  government.  Almost 

executive  ability.  I  believe  his  strength  lay  in  his  suavity.  He  was  the 
reconciler  of  the  estranged,  the  harmonizer  of  those  who  were  at  feud, 
among  his  fellow-partizans.  An  adroit  and  subtle,  rather  than  a  great  man, 
I  judge  that  he  owed  his  election,  first  to  the  Vice-Presidency,  then  to  the 
Presidency,  to  the  personal  favour  and  imperious  will  of  Andrew  Jackson, 
with  whom  '  Love  me,  love  my  dog,'  was  an  iron  rule.  Had  there  been 
no  Jackson,  Van  Buren  would  never  have  attained  the  highest  office  in  the 
gift  of  his  countrymen." 


88  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

single-handed,  he  has  repelled  the  combined  assaults  of  a  ma- 
jority of  the  representative  men  of  his  party  upon  his  friends, 
securing  them  a  tenure  of  office  no  less  firm  than  that  of  the 
law  itself.  In  the  management  of  caucuses,  in  the  manipu- 
lation of  legislative  bodies,  in  the  control  of  conventions,  he 
for  many  years  exhibited  a  skill  and  power  never  approached 
by  any  other  citizen.  The  faculty  which  enables  one  to  make 
seemingly  hostile  elements  coalesce  and  move  together  for  the 
accomplishment  of  a  common  object,  he  possessed  as  no 
American,  surely,  has  ever  possessed  it.  Himself  uncorrupted, 
he  was  the  master  of  all  means  of  corruption;  poor,  he  was 
always  able  to  command  vast  sums  of  money.  Fascinating 
in  manners,  brilliant  in  conversation,  an  accomplished  flatterer, 
his  apartments  were  constantly  visited  by  troops  of  friends 
who  were  too  willing  to  take  his  judgment  as  law,  and  to  exe- 
cute his  plans.  And  yet  he  was  generally  adroit  enough  to 
make  men  believe  that  his  suggestions  were  theirs,  and  that  he 
was  gratefully  drinking  in  wisdom  from  their  perennial  foun- 
tains. In  this  seductive  and  powerful  species  of  flattery  Mr. 
Weed  has  not  been  equalled,  perhaps,  by  any  American  states- 
man; not  even  by  Thomas  Jefferson  or  William  H.  Seward. 
Among  his  many  excellent  qualities  there  was  none  more 
pleasing  and  admirable  than  that  which  prompted  and  enabled 
him  to  win  the  confidence  and  friendship  of  young  men ;  un- 
less it  were  that  other  quality  which  caused  him,  during  a 
period  longer  than  the  average  lifetime  of  an  active  politician, 
to  subdue  his  own  political  aspirations  and  more  than  gener- 
ously, sublimely,  devote  all  his  talents  and  labours  to  gratifying 
the  ambition  of  a  friend. 

Such  was  the  man  who,  in  1838,  brought  Horace  Greeley 
"to  the  front  "of  influential  politicians  in  New  York.  Up 
to  this  time,  these  gentlemen  had  never  met;  but  Mr.  Weed 
had  been  a  constant  reader  of  The  New-Yorker,  and  had  con- 
ceived a  great  liking  for  its  editor,  and  a  just  appreciation  of 
his  talents.  In  view  of  the  vast  importance  of  carrying  the 
State  in  the  election  of  this  year,  it  was  determined  that  a 
campaign  paper  should  be  published  at  Albany,  the  capital. 
And  without  ever  having  seen  him,  Tlmrlow  Weed  made  up 


THE  JEFFEKSONIAN.  89 

his  mind  that  Horace  Greeley  was  of  all  others  the  man  to 
tike  charge  of  the  paper.  Because  of  his  little  acquaintance 
with  the  public  men  of  the  state  outside  of  the  city, — he  had 
never  even  attended  a  state  convention, — Mr.  Greeley  was  no 
little  surprised  to  receive  a  call,  one  morning,  a  few  days  after 
the  political  victory  of  1837,  from  Mr.  Weed,  who  desired  an 
interview  at  his  apartments,  City  Hotel.  Thither  the  new 
acquaintances  proceeded  together,  and  there  met  Mr.  Lewis 
Benedict,  also  of  Albany,  and  the  three  talked  over  the  pro- 
posed campaign  paper.  The  upshot  of  the  matter  was,  Mr. 
Greeley  agreed  to  take  editorial  charge  of  it,  receiving  for  hia 
services  one  thousand  dollars.  The  journal  was  to  be  called 
The  JefFersonian ;  was  to  be  a  small  octavo,  issued  weekly  for 
a  year;  and  virtually  to  be  given  away  at  the  nominal  price 
of  fifty  cents  a  year,  the  expenses  of  the  publication  to  be 
made  up  by  voluntary  contributions  of  public-spirited  Whigs. 
The  acceptance  of  this  position  by  Mr.  Greeley  required  him 
to  be  in  Albany  during  much  of  the  Winter,  and  half  the 
time  in  Summer.  About  two  months  after  the  interview  with 
Mr.  Weed  and  Mr.  Benedict,  having  arranged  his  affairs  in 
New-York  as  well  as  possible,  Mr.  Greeley  took  passage  for 
the  capital,  and  had  a  cold  sleigh-ride  thither,  arriving  at 
Albany  in  the  afternoon  of  the  third  day's  journeying.  The 
first  number  of  The  Jeffersonian  soon  thereafter  appeared,  and 
continued  to  be  published  regularly  according  to  agreement. 
It  was  a  model  political  "  organ."  It  scrupulously  and  con- 
stantly avoided  abuse,  scurrility,  and  railing  accusations.  Its 
contents  were  for  the  most  part  made  up  of  speeches  upon 
current  issues  which  had  fyeen  made  in  Congress,  opposition 
to  the  Independent  or  Sub-Treasury  scheme  being  the  topic  to 
which  the  most  space  was  given;  and  with  great  good  judg- 
ment, because  it  was  the  question  in  which  there  was  the  most 
popular  interest  at  the  time.  The  editorials  were  few,  and 
those  few  almost  always  brief,  never  bitter,  seldom  partisan  in 
spirit.  In  fine,  The  Jeffersonian  sought  to  win  adherents  to 
the  Whig  cause,  by  calm  argumentation,  candour,  and  modera- 


90  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

tion.     It  illustrated  the  wise  and  venerable  adage,  that  flies 
may  be  caught  with  honey,  never  with  vinegar.3 

The  circulation  of  The  Jeffersonian  was  some  fifteen  thou- 
sand copies  each  week.  It  undoubtedly  exercised  a  very 
considerable  influence  among  the  people.  Its  articles,  moder- 
ate in  spirit,  convincing  in  statement,  were  extensively  copied 
by  Whig  journals  in  all  parts  of  the  State,  so  that  whether 
the  paper  itself  did  so  or  not,  its  influence  reached  to  every 
section  of  the  commonwealth.  Though  the  Whigs  this  year 
lost  Maine,  Pennsylvania,  Ohio,  which  they  had  previously 
carried,  they  were  successful  in  New  York,  and  that  too  not- 
withstanding the  election  there  occurred  after  the  discouraging 
results  in  the  states  named  had  become  known.  For  this 

'  Perhaps  the  longest  article  by  Horace  Greeley  which  appeared  in  The 
Jeffersonian,  was  his  account  of  the  well-known  Graves-Cilley  duel  near 
Washington,  in  February,  1838.  After  a  careful  and  full  relation  of  all 
the  facts  in  the  sad  affair,  the  article  concludes: 

"But  enough  of  detail  and  circumstance.  The  reader  who  has  not  peon  the  official 
statement  will  find  its  substance  in  the  foregoing.  He  can  lay  the  blame  where  he 
chooses.  We  blame  only  the  accursed  spirit  of  False  Honour  which  required  this  bloody 
sacrifice  —  the  horrid  custom  of  Duelling  which  exacts  and  palliates  this  atrocity.  It 
appears  evident  that  Mr.  Cilley's  course  must  have  been  based  on  the  determination  that 
Col.  Webb  was  not  entitled  to  be  regarded  as  a  gentleman;  and  if  so,  there  was  hardly  an 
escape  from  a  bloody  conclusion  after  Mr.  Graves  had  once  consented,  however  uncon- 
sciously, to  bear  the  note  of  Col.  Webb.  Each  of  the  parties,  doubtless,  acted  as  he 
considered  due  to  his  own  character;  each  was  right  in  the  view  of  the  duelist's  code  of 
honour,  but  fearfully  wrong  in  the  eye  of  reason,  of  morality,  of  humanity,  and  the  im- 
perative laws  of  man  and  of  Ood.  Of  the  principals,  one  sleeps  cold  and  stiff  beneath  the 
icy  pall  of  winter  and  the  clods  of  the  valley;  the  other  — far  more  to  be  pitied— lives  to 
execrate  through  years  of  anguish  and  remorse  the  hour  when  he  was  impelled  to  imbrue 
his  bands  in  the  blood  of  a  fellow-being. 

"  Mr.  Graves  we  know  personally,  and  a  milder  and  more  amiable  gentleman  is  rarely 
to  be  met  with.  He  has  for  the  last  two  years  been  a  Representative  from  the  Louisville 
District,  Kentucky,  and  is  universally  esteemed  aud  beloved.  Mr.  Cilley  was  a  young  man 
of  one  of  the  best  families  in  New  Hampshire ;  hfs  grandfather  was  a  Colonel  and  after- 
wards a  General  of  the  Revolution.  His  brother  was  a  Captain  in  the  last  War  with 
Great  Britain,  and  leader  of  the  desperate  bayonet  charge  at  Bridgewater.  Mr.  Cilley 
himself,  though  quite  a  young  man,  has  been  for  two  years  Speaker  of  the  House  of 
Representatives  of  Maine,  and  was  last  year  elected  to  Congress  from  the  Lincoln  Dis- 
trict, which  is  decidedly  opposed  to  him  in  politics,  and  which  recently  gave  1,200 
majority  for  the  other  side.  Young  as  he  was,  he  had  acquired  a  wide  popularity  and 
influence  in  his  own  State,  and  was  laying  the  foundation*  of  a  brilliant  career  in  the 
Kational  Councils.  And  this  man,  with  so  many  ties  to  bind  him  to  life,  with  the  sky 
of  his  future  bright  with  hope,  without  an  enemy  on  earth,  and  with  a  wife  and  three 
children  of  tender  age  whom  his  death  must  drive  to  the  verge  of  madness  — has  perished 
miserably  in  a  combat  forbidden  by  God,  growing  out  of  a  difference  so  pitiful  in  itself,  so 
direful  in  its  cons2qnences. 

"Coull  we  add  inything  to  render  the  moral  more  terribly  impressive?" 


THE  HARD   TIMES   OF    1837.  91 

triumph  much  was  due  to  Horace  Greeley's  liberal  and 
efficient  editorial  conduct  of  The  Jeffersonian.  Henceforth  he 
was  recognized  as  potential  in  the  politics  of  the  state. 

It  was  at  this  election  that  William  II;  Seward  was  chosen 
Governor  of  New  York,  defeating  the  distinguished  William 
L.  Marcy  by  more  than  10,000  majority.  The  Whigs  also 
elected  a  large  majority  of  the  Assembly,  but  the  Senate  still 
remained  under  the  control  of  the  Democrats,  and  was  not 
taken  therefrom  until  the  following  year. 

In  addition  to  conducting  The  New-Yorker  and  The  Jeffer- 
sonian,  Mr.  Greeley,  during  the  sessions  of  the  Legislature, 
made  condensed  reports  of  the  Assembly  debates  for  The 
Evening  Journal,  and  also  contributed  several  editorials  to  that 
paper.  And  thus, — Mr.  Weed  being  chief  political  manager, 
Mr.  Seward  having  become  Governor,  Mr.  Greeley  being 
always  reliable  for  good  advice,  vigorous  articles,  and  efficient 
work, — was  gradually  formed  during  the  year  1838  and  the 
early  part  of  the  following  year  the  famous  political  partner- 
ship of  "  Seward,  Weed,  and  Greeley,"  which  was  not  dissolved 
till  after  the  Whig  party  itself  had  passed  away. 

The  political  campaign  of  1840,  in  which  Horace  Greeley 
bore  a  more  conspicuous  part,  perhaps,  than  any  other  private 
citizen,  and  brought  to  bear  as  much  influence  on  the  election 
as  any  other  one  man,  in  or  out  of  office,  was  one  of  the  most 
remarkable  contests  in  all  the  annals  of  politics.  The  party 
which  had  elected  General  Jackson  to  the  Presidency,  had  by 
this  time  taken  the  name  of  the  Democracy.  Jackson  had 
been  President  eight  years,  and,  as  we  have  seen,  had  dictated 
his  successor  in  the  person  of  Martin  Yan  Buren.  The  period 
of  Mr.  Van  Buren's  administration  had  been  characterized  by 
a  tremendous  commercial  revulsion,  under  the  terrible  force  ©f 
which  the  trade,  and  commerce,  and  prosperity  of  the  country 
had  been  paralyzed.  Banks,  merchants,  traders,  farmers  in 
countless  numbers  were  ruined.  Labour  went  begging,  and 
received  few  alms  in  reply  to  its  earnest  supplications.  All 
this  deplorable  state  of  things  was  attributed  to  Mr.  Yan 
Buren  and  the  Democratic  party;  and  the  President,  without 
blame,  as  we  may  now  clearly  see,  for  the  melancholy  situation 


92  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

in  wliich  the  country  found  itself,  soon  discovered  that  he  was 
to  be  held  responsible  for  the  ills  by  which  the  republic  was 
afflicted.  He  doubtless  fully  appreciated  the  difficulty  of 
maintaining  his  position,  and  was  fully  aware  of  the  great 
extent  of  his  unpopularity.  With  a  tine  dignity,  he  appealed 
for  support  to  "  the  sober  second  thought "  of  the  people;  but 
that  sober  second  thought  did  not  come  in  time  to  save  him 
from  overwhelming  defeat. 

It  is  difficult,  at  this  day,  to  conceive  of  the  extent  and  in- 
tensity of  the  popular  feeling  against  Mr.  Van  Buren's 
administration,  as  manifested  first  in  1837,  and  again  in  1840. 
In  1838,  the  elections  generally  were  favourable  to  the  adminis- 
tration; but  the  wave  of  unpopularity  soon  again  returned, 
and  dashed  it  to  pieces  in  the  elections  of  1840.  Not  antici- 
pating any  such  result,  the  Democrats  nominated  Mr.  Van 
Buren  as  a  candidate  for  re-election,  at  a  convention  held  in 
Baltimore.  Vice-President  Richard  M.  Johnson  was  also  again 
placed  on  the  ticket. 

The  Whigs,  meantime,  had  held  their  first  National  Conven- 
tion in  the  city  of  Harrisburgh,  Pennsylvania.  The  convention 
remained  in  session  several  days.  A  plurality  were  in  favour 
of  the  nomination  of  Henry  Clay,  but  a  majority  of  these 
were  from  States  wliich  would  surely  vote  against  him  at  the 
election.  Delegates  from  the  large  "doubtful  States"  of 
Pennsylvania,  Ohio,  and  Indiana,  declared  they  could  carry 
their  States  for  General  Harrison  but  not  for  Mr.  Clay.  After 
a  long  struggle,  General  Harrison  was  nominated,  Horace 
Greeley  and  Thurlow  Weed,  who  were  present,  doing  all  in 
their  power  to  bring  about  that  result.  John  Tyler,  of  Vir- 
ginia,  was  nominated  candidate  for  the  Vice-Presidency.  He 
had  warmly  supported  Mr.  Clay,  and  upon  his  defeat  is  said 
actually  to  have  wept.  However  this  may  be,  his  nomination 
was  an  attempt  on  the  part  of  the  victorious  Harrison  men  to 
soften  the  grief  of  Clay's  devoted  friends. 

It  would  appear  that  there  was  something  in  General  Har- 
rison's history  and  character  which  took  hold  of  the  popular 
heart,  gaining  its  affections  in  a  wonderful  manner.  His 
nomination  had  hardly  been  made,  when  the  delegates  felt  that 


"  TirrECANOE."  93 

success  was  certain.  Means  of  travel  were  not  then  what  they 
are  now.  In  every  town  and  village  through  which  the  re- 
turning delegates  passed,  travelling  by  coach  or  carriage,  they 
were  met  by  crowds  of  men  and  congratulated  upon  the  result 
of  their  labours.  When  they  reached  their  homes  they  felt  as 
though  the  battle  were  already  won. 

If  it  is  not  easy  to  account  for  the  unpopularity  of  Van 
Buren,  the  popularity  of  Harrison  furnishes  a  problem  equally 
perplexing,  unless  carefully  studied.  It  is  certain  that  General 
Harrison  was  one  of  the  plainest  of  men,  and  was  not  pos- 
sessed of  any  great  or  shining  talents.  He  was  not  an  orator. 
In  a  public  assemblage  or  in  a  deliberative  body  he  was  not  to 
be  compared  with  his  defeated  competitor  at  Harrisburgh,  or 
with  his  defeated  competitor  at  the  election.  But  the  people 
are  generally  wiser  than  their  rulers.  Perhaps  the  great  pop- 
ularity of  William  Henry  Harrison  lay  in  the  fact  that  he  was 
one  of  the  people.  He  had  exhibited  courage,  and  all  good  sol- 
dierly qualities.  He  had  manifested  a  capacity  for  the  conduct 
of  public  aftairs.  But  he  was  modest,  retiring,  apparently 
satisfied  with  the  vocation  of  a  farmer.  On  the  other  hand, 
there  was  a  feeling,  widely  spread  over  the  country,  that  Presi- 
dent Yan  Buren  was  an  aristocrat;  that  he  lived  in  grand  and 
lofty  style;  that  he  ate  his  soup  with  a  golden  spoon;  that  the 
people  were  taxed  to  pay  for  this  and  other  extravagant  living. 
The  opinion  was  general  that  the  country  was  in  danger  of 
coming  under  the  control  of  a  "ruling  class,"  whose  power  lay, 
not  in  talents,  nor  in  services  for  the  body  politic  at  large,  but 
in  intrigue.  They  declined  to  make  the  fox  a  representative 
of  their  nationality. 

However  we  may  account  for  it,  it  is  certain  that  Harrison's 
popularity  was  prodigious  at  the  start, — the  people  sponta- 
neously sustained  him, — and  gained  with  every  succeeding  day, 
from  his  nomination  to  his  election.  It  was  increased  rather 
than  diminished  by  the  nature  of  the  assaults  made  upon  him 
by  orators  and  journals  of  the  Democratic  party.  They  ridi- 
culed his  military  career,  charging  him  with  both  imbecility 
and  cowardice.  They  averred  that  he  was  an  old  dotard ;  a 
granny,  who  ought  to  wear  a  red  flannel  petticoat.  Finally 


94:  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GKEELEY. 

an  injudicious  editor  capped  the  climax  of  the  universal  par- 
tisan vituperation  by  saying:  "Give  him  a  log-cabin  and  a 
barrel  of  hard  cider,  and  he  will  be  content  on  his  farm  in 
Ohio,  whose  affairs  only  is  he  capable  of  managing."  Never 
was  unfortunate  sentence  so  big  in  results.  The  taunt  was 
taken  np  by  the  Whig  journals  and  made  use  of  as  an  argu- 
ment to  show  that  we  did  have  a  pretentious  "  ruling  class," 
who  had  become  pampered  with  the  long  possession  of  political 
power,  and  looked  down  with  sneering  contempt  upon  the 
toiling  millions.  Not  only  so,  but  log-cabins  and  hard  cider 
became  prominent  adjuncts  in  the  campaign.  Countless  log- 
cabins  were  raised  at  public  meetings,  and  barrels  of  hard  cider 
drank  beyond  all  powers  of  computation. 

Besides  this  opinion  of  the  people, — and  it  was  substantially 
correct, — that  there  was  an  attempt  to  foist  upon  them  a  ruling 
class,  there  were  other  causes  of  the  political  excitement,  of 
the  popular  fine  frenzy.  We  have  seen  how  effective  was  The 
Jeffersonian  campaign  paper  of  1838  under  Mr.  Greeley's  con- 
trol. In  1840,  he  established  and  conducted  a  paper  which 
was  for  the  whole  republic  what  The  Jeffersonian  had  been  for 
the  State  of  New  York.  This  journal  was,  indeed,  suggested 
— or,  rather,  a  campaign  journal  was  suggested — in  a  council 
of  leading  New  York  Whigs,  consisting  of  Governor  Seward, 
Thurlow  Weed,  and  others,  and  Mr.  Greeley  was  named  as 
editor;  but  the  enterprise,  though  thus  endorsed  and  aided  by 
favourable  opinion,  was  his  own.  No  contributions  were  asked 
or  obtained.  Mr.  Greeley  became  both  editor  and  publisher. 
A  new  partner  whom  he  had  secured  about  this  time, 
frightened  at  the  cheapness  of  the  campaign  paper,  withdrew 
from  the  firm,  so  that  Mr.  Greeley  was  left  to  edit  and  publish 
both  that  and  The  New-Yorker, — a  double  labour  which  he 
performed  without  complaint  not  only,  but  with  a  cheerfulness 
whose  rays  of  jolly  fun  penetrated  every  part  of  the  Union. 

The  name  of  the  new  journal  was  The  Log-Cabin.  It  was  a 
large  sized  folio,  and  the  terms  to  subscribers  were:  $5  for  fif- 
teen copies  for  the  period  of  six  months,  being  from  May  1  to 
November  1.  The  publication  of  the  first  number  was  greeted 
with  a  rush  of  subscribers  never  before  heard  of.  Of  this 


"TIIE  LOO-CABIN."  95 

number  30,000  copies  were  printed,  but  they  failed  to  supply 
the  demand.  The  forms  were  again  put  on  the  press  and 
10,000  additional  copies  printed.  These  were  rapidly  ex- 
hausted, and  there  was  still  demand  for  more,  but,  the  types 
having  been  distributed,  it  could  not  be  supplied.  The  issues 
rapidly  ran  up  to  80,000  copies,  where  they  were  perforce 
stopped,  the  limit  of  the  concern's  printing  and  publishing 
capacity  being  reached.  Mr.  Greeley  long  afterwards  expressed 
the  opinion  that  with  the  machinery  of  distribution  by  news 
companies,  expresses,  etc.,  subsequently  brought  in  vogue,  the 
issues  of  single  numbers  of  The  Log-Cabin  might  have  reached 
a  quarter  of  a  million  copies. 

When  The  Log-Cabin  first  appeared,  the  political  fervour  of 
the  times  had  begun  to  boil.  And  there  never  was  finer  fuel 
to  keep  political  fervour  boiling  lively  than  The  Log-Cabin. 
It  was  very  different  indeed  from  The  JefFersonian,  being  not 
only  argumentative  and  courteous,  but  also  lively,  piquant, 
jolly,  satirical.  Here  was  no  long-faced  Puritan  going  to 
meeting,  but  a  Puritan  at  home  with  hn  week-day  clothes  on, 
in  a  rollicking  mood,  and  tolerably  full  of  Londonderry  hard 
cider.  The  prevailing  excitement  was  caught  up:  fully  repre- 
sented by  wood-cuts,  in  song  (music  accompanying),  and  in 
every  way,  then  heard  of:  and  to  some  extent  intensified  by 
each  succeeding  number  of  the  paper.  There  are  thousands 
of  men  now  living  in  America,  boys  in  1840,  who  remember 
how  eagerly  The  Log-Cabin  was  looked  for  during  that  ever 
memorable  campaign,  and  how,  upon  its  arrival,  it  was  read  by 
every  member  of  the  family  old  enough  to  read,  and  by  many 
of  the  neighbours.  It  is  safe  to  say  that  The  Log-Cabin,  what 
with  old  folks  and  young,  had  at  least  a  million  readers,  and 
countless  babies  to  be  amused  by  "  the  pictures." 

The  political  songs  of  the  period  did  much  also  to  keep  alive 
the  excitement.  Indeed,  it  has  been  said  by  a  popular  writer, 
— Mr.  Parton — that  General  Harrison  was  sung  into  the  Pres- 
idential chair.  If  so  much  power  cannot  be  justly  attributed 
to  the  songs  of  the  times,  it  is  certain  that  they  formed  a  very 
important  element  in  the  canvass.  There  was  a  Harrison  glee- 


96  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GEEELET. 

club  in  every  neighbourhood ;  several  in  every  town;  many  in 
every  city.  And  it  is  a  singular  fact,  that  by  early  abuse  of 
this  glee-club  line  of  political  operations,  the  Democratic  party 
was  estopped  from  taking  advantage  of  it.  Toward  the  close 
of  the  campaign,  the  leaders  saw  that  they  had  made  a  mistake, 
and  undertook  to  rectify  it  by  getting  up  what  they  called  glee- 
clubs  of  their  own.  But,  as  Mr.  Qreeley  might  have  said,  it 
was  no  go.  It  was  not  the  campaign  for  Democratic  glee- 
clubs,  or  any  sort  of  glee.  The  fun  all  came  in  on  the  other 
side  from  the  start,  and  stayed  there  to  the  end.  The  lively 
music  naturally  belonged,  during  that  remarkable  year,  to  the 
"VVhigs,  and  they  monopolized  it.  This  was  thunder  which 
their  opponents  could  not  steal. 

Many  of  the  campaign  songs  originally  appeared  in  The 
Losr-Cabin.  Not  a  few  of  them  were  no  less  comic  in  music 

o 

than  in  words.  The  song-making  and  song-singing  genius  of 
the  nation  seemed  to  be  all  aroused  for  "Tippecanoe  and  Tyler 
too."  There  were  even  political  troubadours  in  those  days; 
and  many  will  recollect  having  been  treated  more  than  once,  by 
some  travelling  singer  on  a  stage-coach,  while  the  horses  wero 
changing,  to  a  number  of  '*  Tippecanoe  "  airs.  The  most  uni- 
versally sung  of  all  the  ballads  of  the  time,  perhaps,  was  the 
one  beginning  with  the  stanza: 

"What  has  caused  this  great  commotion-motion-moUon 

Our  country  through  ? 
It  is  the  ball  a-rolling  on 
For  Tippecanoe  and  Tyler  too, 
For  Tippecanoe  and  Tyler  too; 
And  with  them  we'll  beat  little  Van ; 
Van,  Van,  Van  is  a  used-up  man, 
And  with  them  we'll  beat  little  Van." 

The  original  number  of  stanzas  to  this  song  was  not  very 
great,  but  they  grew  with  the  campaign,  each  event  of  im- 
portance being  duly  chronicled  in  a  new  stanza  or  two, 
usually  published  in  The  Log-Cabin  and  thus  sent  all  over  the 
country.  For  example,  the  result  of  the  Whig  triumph  at  the 
gubernatorial  election  in  Maine,  was  done  up,  in  no  very  saerod 
lines,  as  follows: 


THOM4S   OOKWm.  97 

14 O»  have  you  heard  how  Maine  went,  went,  went? 

It  went  h — 1  bent 
For  Governor  Kent, 
For  Tippecanoe  and  Tyler  too, 
For  Tippecanoe  and  Tyler  too ; 
And  with  them  we  can  beat  any  man, 

Man,  man,  man  of  the  Van  Buren  clan ; 
And  with  them  we'll  beat  little  Van." 

If  there  were  a  Democratic  hickory-pole  raising,  and  the 
pole  broke;  if  there  were  a  Democratic  mass-meeting 
announced,  and  the  masses  failed  to  come,  as  they  often  did;  if 
there  were  any  disaster  to  the  Democracy;  or  if  there  were  any 
good  fortune  to  the  Whigs,  it  would  not  be  midnight  till  the 
glee-clubs  would  have  it,  and  away  they  would  go  serenading, 
"  For  Tippecanoe  and  Tyler  too."  Hundreds  of  these  politi- 
cal songs  first  appeared  in  Mr.  Greeley's  campaign  paper. 
How  many  he  himself  wrote  can  never  be  known,  perhaps, 
but  he  no  doubt  wrote  a  good  many.  There  is  no  kind  ol 
composition  more  easy,  and  as  it  was  now  singularly  effective 
it  may  be  regarded  as  certain  that  he  took  all  due  advantage  of 
it.  But  whatever  may  be  the  fact  herein,  it  is  certain  that 
through  The  Log-Cabin  he  supplied  the  omnipresent  glee-clubs 
with  a  large  share  of  their  songs,  music  inclusive. 

And  so  the  political  cauldron  kept  on  boiling,  and  getting 
hotter  and  hotter  all  the  time.  It  was  not  only  a  canvass  of 
remarkable  campaign  papers,  and  popular  enthusiasm,  and  no 
end  of  songs,  but  also  one  which  must  be  long  noteworthy  on 
account  of  its  eloquence. 

In  General  Harrison's  own  state,  the  Whig  candidate  for 
Governor  was  Thomas  Corwin,  "the  wagon-boy  of  Ohio,"  as 
thousands  of  ribbon  badges,  with  wood-cuts  of  his  jolly  face 
printed  thereon,  amply  testified.  Mr.  Corwin  was,  perhaps, 
the  most  eloquent  orator  we  have  ever  had  in  the  United  States, 
unless  it  may  be  thought  that  Sargent  S.  Prentiss  may  have 
equalled  him  in  power  before  a  public  assembly.  Mr.  Corwin 
was  master  of  every  kind  of  oratory,  and  whether  he  was  argu- 
mentative, grave,  humourous,  or  what  not,  he  held  his  audiences 
as  if  by  enchantment,  and  never  failed  to  convince  many  of  the 
correctness  of  his  views.  Though  he  had  not  received  the 
7 


98  LIFE  OF   HORACE   OREELEY. 

advantages  of  an  early  education,  he  had  when  the  campaign  of 
1840  came  on,  stored  his  mind  by  extensive  reading,  which  his 
wonderful  memory  retained  with  singular  power  and  accuracy. 
He  had  reflected  much,  and  had  become  a  man  both  of  culture 
and  of  wisdom.  Nature,  it  would  appear,  had  made  him  an 
orator.  No  actor  ever  had,  after  long  years  of  study,  a  more 
wonderful  versatility  of  expression  of  face.  Mr.  Corwin,  at 
one  instant,  could  look  as  solemn  as  the  grave,  the  next  as  jolly 
as  Mr.  Burton  ever  appeared.  His  countenance  would  some- 
times fairly  flash  with  indignation,  as  he  spoke  of  a  perpetrated 
or  contemplated  wrong,  and  might  in  a  few  moments  be 
expressive  of  gentleness  and  all  humane  goodness,  in  an  appeal 
in  behalf  of  the  wronged.  No  man  could  state  an  argument 
more  clearly  and  forcibly  than  he;  no  man  more  effectively 
appeal  to  the  better  natures  and  nobler  instincts  of  his  kind. 
There  have  been  few  of  our  public  men  to  surpass  him  in  in- 
tellectual power;  not  one  who  ever  approached  the  sublime 
moral  and  political  courage  of  his  speech  against  the  Mexican 
war;  not  one  who  was  his  equal  in  the  power  both  to  entertain 
and  persuade  great  numbers  of  men.  The  secret  of  his  sur- 
passing power  was  in  his  great  human  kindness.  No  more 
generous  heart  ever  beat  than  his.  He  spoke,  night  and  day, 
during  most  of  the  campaign.  Many  an  Ohioan  will  recollect 
his :  "  And  now,  my  friends,  I  will  tell  you  a  story  out  of 
Horace  Greeley's  Log-Cabin; "  or  his:  "  Now  my  Democratic 
friends,  if  you  do  not  believe  me,  you  will  find  it  all  in  Horace 
Greeley's  Log-Cabin,  which,  I  take  it,  is  good  enough  political 
Bible  for  anybody,  and  especially  for  those  so  much  in  need  of 
salvation!" 

Mr.  Corwin  was  greatly  aided  in  his  campaign  by  the  Hon. 
John  J.  Crittenden,  of  Kentucky.  They  were  excellent  stump- 
speaking  companions,  Mr.  Crittenden  at  that  time  being  ever 
dignified,  almost  severe  in  manner,  though  strong  in  argument 
and  often  splendid  in  appeal,  while  "  the  wagon-boy "  never 
failed  to  amuse,  as  well  as  instruct.  Thomas  Ewing,  also, 
afterwards  Secretary  of  the  Interior,  made  many  a  good  speech 
during  the  campaign,  and  most  felicitously  responded  to  many 
a  serenade,  composed  of  songs  taken  from  The  Log-Cabin. 


LOO-CABIN   BARBECUES.  99 

William  Bebb,  afterwards  Governor  of  the  State,  Robert  0. 
Scherick,  Lewis  D.  Campbell,  Charles  Anderson,  and  others 
who  afterwards  attained  celebrity,  spoke  nearly  as  often  if  not 
as  effectively"  as  Corwin  himself, 

The  prevailing  enthusiasm  and  The  Log-Cabin  stirred  tip 
Indiana,  too,  where  Henry  S.  Lane,  especially,  then  a  young 
lawyer  recently  from  Kentucky,  and  Joseph  Marshall,  "the 
sleeping  lion  of  Hoosierdom,"  gained  no  little  celebrity  as  ora- 
tors. The  State  was  carried  by  the  Whigs  at  the  August 
election,  whereby  Tilman  A.  Howard,  one  of  the  greatest  and 
purest  men  Indiana  ever  produced,  was  defeated  for  Governor. 

Perhaps  the  greatest  public  meetings  were  held  in  the  West, 
as  was  proper,  General  Harrison  being  a  Western  man.  But 
they  were  held  in  all  parts  of  the  country,  and  many  orators, 
since  greatly  distinguished  in  public  life,  then  had  larger  audi- 
ences than  most  of  them  have  ever  had  since.  Governor 
Seward  was  active  in  New  York,  of  course;  and  was  ably  sus- 
tained by  Millard  Fillmore,  Francis  Granger,  General  Erastus 
Hoot,  Lewis  C.  Levin,  and  others.  The  eloquent  S.  S.  Prentiss, 
John  Bell,  Tyler,  the  scholarly  Legaire,  "  rolled  on  the  ball " 
in  the  South,  and  everywhere  it  gained  strength  like  an 
avalanche. 

There  never  were  in  America  so  many  and  so  great  political 
gatherings  as  in  the  Log-Cabin  campaign.  With  the  exception 
of  South  Carolina  and  a  few  other  Southern  States,  immense 
meetings  of  the  people  took  place  in  every  State.  They  were 
often  called  barbecues,  from  the  fact  that  animals  were  cooked 
whole  and  served  out,  when  duly  carved,  to  the  people  gratui- 
tously. These  "  free  barbecues  "  were  regular  institutions,  so 
to  speak,  of  the  times.  It  took  a  whole  day  and  night  to  get 
through  with  a  first-class  barbecue.  Abcnt  ten  o'clock  in  the 
morning,  the  people  would  begin  to  come  in  from  the  country, 
in  wagons  and  carriages,  and  on  horseback.  They  would  be 
formed  into  procession,  in  the  line  of  which  would  be  from 
one  to  a  dozen  genuine  log-cabins  mountad  on  wheels,  drawn 
by  from  four  to  twenty  horses,  and  each  cabin  containing  a 
barrel  of  hard  cider.  Glee-clubs  were  well  interspersed,  in 
band-wagons,  through  the  procession;  and  the  very  stones  of 


100  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

the  streets  might  bear  that  they  sang  "  Tippecanoe  and  Tyler 
too."  After  the  procession,  came  the  free  dinner;  then  the 
speeches.  At  night  there  were  torch-light  processions  and 
turpentine-balls,  interspersed  with  short  addressed.  All  parts 
of  the  programme  were  well  spiced  with  glee-club  and  hard 
cider  condiments;  and  in  all  these  immense  meetings  in  all 
parts  of  the  Union,  but  particularly  in  the  Middle  and  Western 
States,  any  one  could  see  the  opinion  was  quite  general,  that 
"  Horace  Greeley's  Log-Cabin  was  good  enough  political 
Bible  for  any  body." 

Many  journals  bore  an  influential  part  in  this  stirring 
campaign.  The  New-York  Express,  for  many  years  edited  by 
James  and  Erastus  Brooks,  was  "decidedly  Whig."  Mr. 
Thurlow  Weed's  Albany  Evening  Journal  was  never  more 
vigourously  conducted.  Mr.  George  D.  Prentice,  of  The 
Louisville  Journal,  had  it  been  possible,  would  have  outshone 
himself;  and  certainly  he  laboured  only  less  energetically  and 
efficiently,  and  sparkled  only  less  brilliantly  than  during  the 
next  great  campaign  when  his  idolized  *'  Harry  of  the  West " 
headed  the  national  ticket.  The  Cincinnati  Gazette  and  the 
State  Journal,  of  Columbus,  Ohio,  were  exceedingly  potential 
in  General  Harrison's  own  State.  Everywhere  the  newspapers 
of  the  Whig  party,  both  small  and  great,  sympathized  with 
the  universal  enthusiasm  and  gallantly  fought  for  the  cause. 
But  not  one,  not  even  several  combined,  had  the  general 
circulation  and  consequent  influence  of  Horace  Greeley's  Log- 
Cabin.  It  was  the  campaign  paper  of  the  campaign.  It  need 
scarcely  be  added,  therefore,  that  when  the  campaign  closed  in 
unprecedented  and  magnificent  triumph,  Horace  Greeley  waa 
about  as  widely  known  throughout  the  republic  as  any  of  hei 
citizens. 

I  have  deemed  it  just  thus  somewhat  fully  to  describe  the 
notable  campaign  of  1§40,  because  I  believe  it  to  be  true  that 
Horace  Greeley's  influence  in  that  campaign  was  greater  than 
that  of  any  other  one  poison.  It  may  be  said,  admitting 
this  to  be  true,  it  may  only  show  a  remarkably  fortunate 
newspaper  "hit,"  without  manifesting  unusual  prescience  or 
political  wisdom.  If  there  be  those  who  choose  so  to  think, 


PRESIDENT  HARBISON'S  DEATH.  101 

BO  be  it.  But  they  will  please  to  remember  that,  almost  in  a 
minority  of  one  in  the  East,  he  favoured  the  nomination  of 
General  Harrison  in  1836;  and  that  his  unexpected  successes 
of  this  year  prefigured  the  triumph  of  four  years  later.  They 
will  also  please  to  remember  that  a  great  share  of  the  enthu- 
siasm of  the  Log-cabin  campaign  grew  out  of  the  history  and 
character  of  General  Harrison.  And,  further,  that  no  man, 
confessedly,  did  so  much  to  fan  that  enthusiasm  into  a  fine 
flame  of  fervour  spreading  all  over  the  land  as  the  unpretend- 
ing, modest  Editor  of  The  Log-Cabin.  One  must  needs  treat 
to  some  extent  of  historical  events,  when  writing  the  life  of  a 
man  who  did  so  much  to  create  historical  events  as  Horace 
Greeley. 

The  joy  of  the  people  at  the  Whig  success  was  very  great, 
and  by  no  means  confined  to  members  of  the  Whig  party.  It 
was  also  manifested  no  less  clearly  upon  General  Harrison's 
inauguration,  March  4,  1841.  The  gloom  which  settled  down 
upon  the  majority  at  his  untimely  and  sudden  death,  only  one 
month  afterwards,  it  at  once  transpiring  that  President  Tyler 
would  depart  from  the  cherished  policy  of  the  Whigs,  was 
most  sadly  depressing  upon  them,  and  not  without  visible  ill 
effects  upon  the  country  at  large. 

Mr.  Greeley  still  continued  to  edit  and  publish  both  The 
New-Yorker  and  The  Log-Cabin,  but  before  the  death  of 
President  Harrison  had  determined  to  undertake  that  great 
enterprise,  whose  remarkable  success  placed  him  at  the  head 
of  the  most  influential  profession,  and  made  his  name  more, 
and  more  favourably,  known  in  Christendom  than  that  of  any 
American  citizen  not  in  exalted  official  position. 


CHAPTER   VII. 

FOUNDER  OF  THE  NEW -YORK  TRIBUNE. 

Resumfe  of  Public  Journalism  up  to  the  Time  of  the  New-York  Tribune— 
The  Partisan  Press  —  "Organs"  —  Noted  Party  Editors:  Isaac  Hil", 
Thomas  Ritchie,  Edwin  Croswell,  Duff  Green,  Andrew  Jackson,  Amos 
Kendall,  Francis  P.  Blair,  John  C.  Rives;  "The  Kitchen  Cabinet "  — 
The  National  Intelligencer  —  Gales  and  Seaton  —  Charles  Hammond ; 
George  D.  Prentice  —  New-York  Journalism  Goes  to  the  Front — The 
Six-Penny  Journals  — William  C.  Bryant,  James  Watson  Webb,  and 
Other  Journalists  of  the  Old  R6gimc  —  The  Cheap  Press  —  The  New- 
York  Sun  — The  Herald  and  James  Gordon  Bennett  — The  Herald 
Originally  a  Journal  Without  Principle  —  A  Newspaper  Vacuum 
Thereby  Caused  —  Horace  Greeley  Establishes  The  Tribune,  Price  One 
Cent  — Its  Early  History  —  Mr.  Thomas  McElrath  —  Character  of  The 
Tribune  —  Devoted  to  the  Welfare  of  the  People  —  Welcomes  All  New 
Ideas  —  Success. 

A  HISTORY  of  journalism  in  the  United  States  is  a  desideratum 
in  American  literature.  In  the  cause  of  human  progress,  of 
the  spread  of  liberal,  just  principles  of  government,  there  is 
no  single  means  of  influence,  perhaps,  \vhich  has  been  so 
powerful  as  the  free  press  of  the  American  republic.  This 
vast  influence  has  been  exercised  in  a  two-fold  manner:  First, 
by  successful  attacks  upon  political  and  social  ills,  venerable, 
it  may  be,  with  years,  firmly  established  by  custom  and  preju- 
dice, but  prolific  ever  of  misery  and  iniquity.  Secondly,  by 
the  advocacy  of  new  ideas,  whose  practical  establishment  has 
conferred  great  blessings  upon  mankind,  and  is  likely  to  confer 
many  more,  as  a  logical  result  of  reforms  already  inaugurated. 
Before  the  assaults  of  our  free  press  many  vicious  institutions 
have  fallen  in  ruins  too  long  delayed;  and  at  its  magical  touch 
have  sprung  up  in  their  stead  beautiful  and  beneficent  systems. 
It  has  become  itself  a  great  institution,  and,  upon  the  whole 
thus  far  in  its  history,  a  benignant  one.  We  speak  of  a  college 

(102) 


POLITICAL  "HAND-ORGANS."  103 

or  a  university  as  an  institution.  But  a  college  or  a  university  - 
can  confer  its  course  of  education  upon  but  a  few  hundreds  at 
most  annually.  The  press  has  become  the  educator  of  the 
whole  people,  the  presidents  and  professors  of  colleges,  in 
many  things,  and  the  masses  generally.  Its  pupils  are  all  the 
citizens  of  the  republic,  and  not  a  few  subjects  of  foreign 
nations. 

The  rise,  progress,  and  great  development,  of  late  years, 
especially,  of  an  institution  of  such  vast  and  varied  influences, 
is  a  topic  for  historical  research  and  philosophical  disquisition 
of  great  and  permanent  interest.  It  cannot  be  long  till  such 
a  work  as  that  of  which  I  speak,  shall  be  forthcoming. 
Meantime,  let  us  hastily  review  so  much  of  the  history  of 
modern  journalism  as  will  enable  us  to  correctly  estimate  the 
work  done  therein  by  Horace  Greeley.1 

Up  to  a  short  period  before  the  founding  of  the  daily  paper 
with  which  Mr.  Greeley's  name  will  be  permanently  connected, 
nearly  all  American  journals  were  party  "organs."  This  was 
a  misnomer,  or,  rather,  only  a  half  name.  They  should  have 
been  called  "  hand-organs,"  for  the  palpable  reason  that  hand- 
organs  can  only  grind  out  those  particular  tunes  which  the 
machines  are  manufactured  to  play,  whereas  the  organ,  in  the 
hands  of  a  fine  performer,  has  illimitable  musical  capacity. 
So  the  party  "  organ  "  was  confined  to  a  narrow  sphere,  with- 
in which  discussion  became  wonderfully  acrimonious  at  times 
and  exceedingly  profitless. 

Nevertheless,  there  were  many  surpassingly  acute  and 
brilliant  minds  engaged  upon  the  partizan  press  of  America 
contemporaneously  with  Horace  Greeley's  first  essays  in  editor- 
ial composition.  There  was  Isaac  Hill,  editor  of  The  New 
Hampshire  Patriot,  of  general  circulation  and  large  influence 
throughout  New  England.  Mr.  Hill  was  a  man  of  great  polit- 

1  While  this  volume  is  being  prepared,  "Journalism  in  the  United  States 
from  1G90  to  1872,"  by  Mr.'  Frederic  Hudson  has  appeared, — a  large  volume, 
containing  immense  store  of  curious,  useful,  interesting  facts.  A  more 
valuable  or  more  readable  volume  has  not  recently  been  published.  I  find 
myself  compelled  to  disagree  with  some  of  Mr.  Hudson's  opinions,  but 
gladly  acknowledge  many  and  great  obligations  to  his  work,  which  ought 
to  be  very  generally  read,  and  soon  revised. 


104  LITE  OF   HORACE   GREELEY 

ical  sagacity,  pluck,  and  persistency.  lie  is  said  to  have  been 
instigator  of  President  Jackson's  war  on  the  United  States 
Bank,  which  resulted  in  the  destruction  of  that  once  powerful 
institution.  Thomas  Ritchie  had  long  edited  The  Richmond 
Enquirer  on  the  platform  of  the  Virginia  Resolutions  of  1798 
and  '99.  His  journal  came  to  have  considerable  circulation 
and  undoubted  influence  in  all  portions  of  the  South.  Ritchie 
was  a  strong  writer,  but  not  quite  servile  enough  to  be  always 
in  good  odour  at  political  headquarters.  "It  is  true,"  said 
President  Jackson,  "  Mr.  Ritchie  is  an  experienced  editor,  but 
Bometimes  goes  off  at  half-cock  before  he  sees  the  whole  ground, 
and  does  the  party  great  injury  before  he  sees  his  error,  and 
then  has  great  difficulty  to  get  back  into  the  right  track  again. 
Witness  his  course  on  my  removal  of  the  deposits,"  etc.  Just 
as  if  it  were  not  possible  for  a  President  to  "  go  off  at  half- 
cock  before  he  sees  the  whole  ground."  Edwin  Croswell  and 
"  the  Albany  Regency  "  had  made  The  Albany  Argus  of  great 
influence  in  New  York,  to  be  overturned  at  last  only  by  the 
powerful  political  partnership  of  "  Seward,  Weed,  &  Greeley." 
There  were  not  a  few  party  organs  in  the  South  and  West, 
sustaining  the  ruling  powers,  conducted  by  men  of  great 
experience  and  ability. 

But  up  to  1840,  when  The  Log-Cabin  by  Horace  Greeley 
attained  a  national  circulation  and  influence,  the  party  organs 
of  the  Federal  Capital  were  the  most  widely  known.  Mr.  Duff 
Green  for  many  years  conducted  The  Telegraph  at  Washington, 
and  with  great  spirit  and  power.  But  President  Jackson 
suspected  Green's  fidelity  to  "  the  party,"  and  The  Washing- 
ton Globe  was  established.  It  was  edited  by  Andrew  Jackson, 
Francis  P.  Blair,  John  C.  Rives,  and  Amos  Kendall,  the  last 
three  of  whom  were  known  all  over  the  country  as  "  the 
Kitchen  Cabinet."  It  was  a  very  powerful  editorial  coalition. 
Jackson  could  not  write  a  sentence  in  respectable  English,  but 
he  could  dictate  articles  of  great  vigour  and  political  wisdom. 
He  dictated  and  Kendall  wrote.  Mr.  Blair  was  a  sagacious 
politician  and  a  strong  writer.  Mr.  Rives  was  a  man  of 
gigantic  stature,  imperturbable  good  nature,  and  fine  mind. 
We  have,  perhaps,  never  had  a  finer  editorial  diplomat.  Mr. 


CIIARLES   HAMMOND   AND   GEOKGE   D.    PRENTICE.  105 

Kendall  also  contributed  able  articles  of  his  own  to  The  Globe. 
It  spoke,  therefore,  as  one  having  authority,  and  reached  every 
portion  of  the  country. 

The  party  organ  of  greatest  influence  among  the  "Whigs,  up 
to  the  time  of  The  Log-Cabin,  was  The  National  Intelligencer 
of  Washington.  The  Intelligencer  was  the  organ,  in  1800,  of 
the  administration  of  Thomas  Jefferson,  being,  in  fact,  the  first 
recognized  organ  of  the  government  in  the  United  States.  It 
continued  to  be  the  organ  of  government  during  the  adminis- 
trations of  both  Madison  and  Monroe.  Tims  it  had  great 
patronage,  general  circulation,  and  vast  influence.  Its  owners 
and  editors  for  many  years  were  Joseph  Gales,  Jr.,  and  William 
Winston  Seaton,  who,  being  excellent  reporters  as  well  as 
excellent  editors  gave  their  journal  a  value  not  possessed  by 
any  other  in  those  times.  When  The  Intelligencer  found 
itself  in  the  opposition,  and  the  organ  of  the  minority,  its 
editorial  contributors  embraced  some  of  the  first  statesmen  of 
the  country,  including  Daniel  Webster  himself.  As  a  party 
organ  it  has  never  been  surpassed  in  efficiency,  dignity,  and 
preeminent  respectability ;  and  it  became  a  recognized  authority 
in  questions  of  American  political  history  with  intelligent  men 
of  all  parties. 

The  Intelligencer  had  many  able  cooperative  party  organs  in 
the  country;  but  none  were  more  efficient,  it  is  believed,  than 
two  Western  journals,  during  a  considerable  portion  of  the 
era  of  party  organs.  These  were  The  Cincinnati  Gazette, 
under  the  editorship  of  Charles  Hammond,  assisted  by  William 
D.  Gallagher;  and  The  Louisville  Journal,  George  D.  Prentice, 
editor.  Mr.  Hammond  was  a  man  of  genius;  a  vigorous 
writer;  a  reformer.  He  infused  into  his  paper  a  spirit  of 
independence,  quite  unique  at  that  time  in  public  journalism, 
and  thus  gave  to  The  Gazette  a  greater  influence  than  it  could 
otherwise  have  reached;  and  herein  he  forecast  the  power  of 
the  independent  press.  • 

In  the  history  of  all  these  and  other  party  organs  of  the  era 
now  under  review,  we  shall  find  little  of  permanent  value; 
little  to  admire,  unless  it  be  admirable  to  waste  brilliant 
talents  and  undoubted  genius  in  the  discussion  of  topics  of 


106  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GKEELET. 

ephemeral  interest,  and  in  the  exclusive  advocacy  of  policies 
of  inconsiderable  and  temporary  value.  The  essential  error  of 
this  partizan  journalism  may  well  be  considered  as  demon- 
strated by  the  fact  that  the  result  of  the  rule  of  the  contending 
parties  of  which  the  journals  of  the  times  were  the  organs, 
was  a  civil  war  of  several  years'  duration  and  most  lamentable 
effects,  growing  out  of  a  question  which  both  parties  had  made 
"a  finality"  of  by  solemn  act  of  Congress,  and  party  resolu- 
tions. It  is  also  a  notable  fact  that  most  of  the  old  party 
organs  have  passed  entirely  out  of  existence;  have  been  cast 
away  into  the  useless  debris  of  the  past,  and  endless  oblivion. 
Such,  we  may  clearly  see,  is  the  certain  fate  of  those  which 
were  the  most  distinguished  in  their  generation. 

About  the  time  the  power  of  the  party  organs  was  at  its 
highest  development,  circumstances  and  genius  combined  to 
transfer  the  centre  of  intelligence,  as  supplied  by  newspapers, 
from  the  National  Capital  to  the  Commercial  Emporium  of 
the  nation.  Intercourse  between  New- York  and  the  country 
at  large  increased  with  the  development  of  the  material 
resources  of  the  republic  and  the  growth  of  the  city.  The 
statesmanship  of  De  "Witt  Clinton  had  made  New- York  the 
trade-centre  of  the  nation.  Its  merchants,  manufacturers, 
bankers,  capitalists,  shippers,  and  others  actively  engaged  in 
business  formed  a  large  and  intelligent  community,  who  cared 
less  for  acts  of  Congress  than  the  price  of  commodities.  The 
number  of  just  such  men  in  the  country  increased  with  the 
increase  of  trade.  And,  though  politics  sympathized  with  this 
movement,  practical  questions  taking  the  place  of  what  had 
now  come  to  be  abstractions,  yet  did  other  subjects  of  reflection 
and  interest  grow,  in  the  aggregate,  more  attractive  to  large 
numbers  of  the  public.  Affairs  of  government  ceased  to  be 
paramount  to  all  others.  The  intelligence  of  the  people 
undoubtedly  increased  at  as  rapid  ratio  as  the  country  grew  in 
wealth.  They  perceived  that  there  might  be  too  much  of 
politics  as  well  as  too  much  government.  Thus,  with  the 
increase  of  the  variety  of  pursuits,  of  intelligence,  of  trade, 
the  power  of  journals  almost  exclusively  political  naturally 
decreased.  And  the  city  of  New- York,  having  become  the 


THE   SEX- PENNY   JOURNALS.  107 

financial  and  commercial  centre  of  the  nation,  logically  became 
the  centre  of  current  intelligence. 

The  city  of  New- York  had  a  number  of  daily  journals  of 
considerable  circulation  and  unquestioned  ability  long  before 
the  establishment  of  the  cheap  or  the  independent  press. 
These  were  six-penny  journals,  and  were  not  hawked  about 
the  streets  for  sale  by  ragged  newsboys.  They  were  delivered 
to  subscribers  by  regular  carriers,  and  sold  from  stands  at 
hotels  and  other  places  of  public  resort.  It  would  not  have 
been  in  accordance  with  the  fitness  of  things  for  a  six-penny 
journal  of  the  old  school  to  be  gold  by  newsboys.  But  here 
the  editorial  abilities  of  "William  Cullen  Bryant,  the  poet,  were 
exercised  through  the  columns  of  The  Evening  Post  —  a 
journal  which  continues  to  exert  large  influence  and  receive 
unbounded  respect,  having  passed  from  the  old  to  the  new 
school  without  losing  any  of  the  good  old  ways  or  adopting 
any  of  the  bad  of  the  new.  The  celebrated  James  Watson 
Webb  was  long  the  editor  of  The  Courier  and  Enquirer, 
which  may  be  said  to  have  ceased  being  a  party  organ  upon 
its  abandonment  of  Jackson,  when  he  removed  the  govern- 
ment deposits  from  the  United  States  banks.  Mr.  M.  M.  Noah, 
for  many  years  noted  in  New- York  journalism  and  letters, 
quite  distinguished  on  account  of  being  once  completely 
extinguished  by  Horace  Greeley,  was  long  connected  with 
Colonel  Webb's  paper.  The  Express,  edited  by  James  and 
Erastus  Brooks,  came  into  existence  after  the  new  era  had 
begun,  but  for  some  time  clung  to  the  old  style.  Mr.  James 
Gordon  Bennett  had  been  editorially  connected  with  several 
of  the  six-penny  journals  before  he  founded  The  Herald.  The 
names  of  others  might  be  given,  but  we  have  enough  in  these 
to  show  that  there  was  a  great  deal  of  talent  in  the  "  blanket- 
sheets,"  as  they  have  since  been  often  called,  of  the  transition 
era  between  party  organs  and  fearless  journalism. 

Between  the  era  of  the  six-penny  journals,  and  the  beginning 
of  the  era  of  what  may  well  be  called  The  Great  Journals, 
there  was  a  period  which  may  be  conveniently  described  as 
that  of  The  Cheap  Newspapers.  They  were  the  modest  begin- 


108  LITE   OF   HOEACE   GEEELEY. 

nings  of  journalism  as  an  independent  power  in  the  republic 
and  in  Christendom. 

"  The  child  is  father  of  the  man." 

The  newsboys  made  the  great  journals  of  the  present  time 
possible.  They  were  the  progenitors  of  the  express  com- 
panies; the  news  companies;  which  are  but  expanded  news- 
boys; practical  machinery  by  which  the  little  Pucks  put 
girdles  round  about  the  earth  in  forty  minutes. 

We  have  already  seen  that  the  origin  of  cheap  journals, 
with  the  introduction  of  newsboys,  is  due  to  The  Morning 
Post,  of  which  Story  and  Greeley  were  the  printers  during  its 
short  life.  It  was  followed  by  The  Sun,  which  still  continues 
to  "  shine  for  all."  The  first  number  of  The  Sun  appeared, 
September  3,  1833 — a  very  small  paper,  containing  a  few  items 
of  news,  a  short  story,  a  poem,  police  intelligence,  and  four 
columns  of  advertisements.  But  in  two  months  The  Sun  had 
a  circulation  of  two  thousand,  which  in  twelve  months  more 
was  increased  to  eight  thousand,  which  was  probably  more 
than  double  that  of  any  six-penny  journal  in  the  city,  and 
four  or  five  times  greater  than  some  of  the  favourites  of  Wall 
street. 

The  success  of  The  Sun  incited  several  men  to  undertake 
similar  enterprises,  some  of  which  were  for  a  time  quite  suc- 
cessful, but  it  was  not  till  1835  that  another  great  and  perma- 
nent success  in  cheap-for-cash  papers  was  inaugurated.  This 
was  done  by  the  genius  and  enterprise  of  Mr.  James  Gordon 
Bennett,  the  founder  of  The  New-York  Herald. 

Before  the  establishment  of  the  paper  which  finally  became 
the  great  journal  with  whose  name  that  of  Mr.  Bennett  will 
long  be  creditably  connected,  its  founder  had  had  considerable 
editorial  experience  upon  party  organs  and  six-penny  "  blanket- 
sheets."  He  was  a  man  of  great  shrewdness,  unusual  energy, 
and  uncommon  intellectual  parts.  Thinking  of  the  just 
renown  of  his  later  years,  men  are  apt  to  forget  that  when  he 
established  The  Herald,  he  was  an  adventurer:  impecunious, 
unconscionable,  seeming  to  be  without  principles  except  those 
which  were  bad;  determined  to  succeed,  success,  in  his  view, 


JAMES  GORDON  BENNETT.  109 

as  he  was  then  constituted,  being  made  up  of  power  and  money. 
The  first  number  of  this  remarkable  man's  newspaper  appeared 
May  6,  1835.  Its  price  was  one  cent.  It  was  in  every  respect 
superior  to  any  of  its  co temporary  penny  journals,  but  partic- 
ularly in  its  reports  of  Wall  street  operations,  which  were  very 
full,  lively,  and  correct.  They  were  prepared  by  Mr.  Bennett 
himself.  He  may  well  be  said,  indeed,  to  have  been  the  sole 
editor  of  The  Herald  for  some  time  after  its  establishment. 
He  assailed  pretty  much  everything,  except  those  things,  the 
pandering  to  which  might  help  the  sale  of  The  Herald.  Mr. 
Bennett  might  appear  to  have  been  in  irrepressible  conflict 
with  all  things  which  were  respectable  and  of  good  report. 
One  would  conclude  that  he  had  deliberately  made  up  his  mind 
that  The  Herald  must  live,  and  move,  and  have  its  being  in 
sensations.  If  they  were  not  to  be  had,  ready-made,  they  were 
manufactured.  And  thus,  the  newsboys  invariably  having 
some  taking  cry  with  which  to  announce  The  Herald,  its  sales 
rapidly  increased,  and  not  many  months  after  its  initial  num- 
ber it  had  a  larger  circulation  than  any  daily  journal  in  the 
city.  Its  price  was  raised  to  two  cents,  but  without  even  t. 
temporary  decrease  of  sales.  Railways  and  steamships  no\\ 
coming  in  use,  advantage  thereof  was  promptly  and  fully 
taken  by  Mr.  Bennett,  so  that  both  in  the  collection  of  news 
and  the  circulation  of  his  paper  he  fairly  beat  any  of  his  com- 
petitors. 

There  can  be  no  doubt  that  in  respect  of  newspaper  enter- 
prise, Mr.  Bennett's  example  and  influence  conferred  great 
interest  upon  his  own  journal  and  great  benefit  upon  journal- 
ism generally.  But  it  is  undeniable  that  in  the  earlier  history 
of  The  Herald,  its  enterprise  was  often  most  sadly  misdirected. 
It  assaulted  those  things  which  it  ought  to  have  defended, 
because  to  assail  them  was  popular,  and  put  money  in  the  purse 
of  The  Herald's  editor.  It  defended  those  things  which  it 
should  have  attacked,  because  to  defend  them  was  popular,  and 
added  to  the  sales  and  advertisements  of  The  New- York  Herald. 
There  was  not  a  struggling  reform,  no  matter  how  beneficent 
in  nature,  nor  how  devoted  were  its  adherents,  which  was  not 
ridiculed  by  The  Herald.  There  was  no  popular  vice,  nor 


110  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GKEELEY. 

peccadillo  of  general  practice,  which  it  did  not  in  one  way  or 
another  sustain.  Its  assaults  upon  discreditable  operations  of 
Wall  street  were  not  made  because  the  operations  were  discred- 
itable, but  because  their  exposure  sold  The  Herald.  Mr.  Ben- 
nett became  involved  in  personal  rencontres  on  the  street,  and 
was  personally  chastised  in  his  own  office,  on  account  of  offen- 
sive articles.  So  far  did  he  proceed  in  the  course  of  pandering 
to  popular  prejudice,  envy,  the  love  of  scandal,  that  it  came  to 
be  said  his  hand  was  against  every  man's  and  every  man's  hand 
against  his.  The  Herald  came  to  be  called  an  audacious,  black- 
mailing concern. 

Asa  matter  of  course  it  was  assailed  by  other  journals,  none 
of  which  were  equal  to  it  in  enterprise,  and  certainly  none 
could  compare  with  it  in  total  abstinence  from  all  that  makes 
up  principle.  Hundreds  of  the  most  reputable  citizens  of 
New- York  would  not  allow  The  Herald  to  be  read  by  their 
families,  or  taken  to  their  counting-rooms  and  offices.  Such 
could  not  have  been  the  case  had  not  The  Herald  subjected 
itself  to  just  and  indignant  criticism.  No  unjust  assaults  of 
envious  cotemporaries  could  have  brought  about  such  a  state 
of  things.  No  matter  if  The  Herald  was  not  injured  in  circu- 
lation and  pecuniary  value  by  these  attacks.  It  was  greatly 
injured  in  this:  that  it  failed  to  receive  the  respect  of  most 
men  whose  opinions  were  entitled  to  most  respect.  Why? 
Because,  in  sober  truth,  The  New- York  Herald,  in  its  earlier 
history,  was  the  champion,  or  at  best  the  apologist  of  the  bad, 
and  apparently  the  foe  of  the  good  in  society.  Corner-gro- 
ceries and  prize  fights  were  of  more  value  in  its  sight,  than 
moral  reforms  and  Christian  civilization. 

Thus,  it  may  be  readily  seen,  The  Herald  created,  so  to 
speak,  a  vacuum  in  New- York  journalism.  There  was  a 
journal,  with  an  extensive  circulation,  of  audacity,  of  enter- 
prise, of  great  influence;  but  there  was  not  a  journal  of 
enterprise  devoted,  as  well  to  the  publication  of  the  .current 
intelligence  of  the  times,  as  to  making  society  better,  by 
proclaiming  good  and  assailing  evil.  And  this  vacuum  Horace 
Greeley  rushed  in  to  fill  with  The  New- York  Tribune.  A 
New- York  Herald  made  a  New- York  Tribune  necessary.  The 


THE  TRIBrtfh.  Ill 


I/)g-Cabin,  though  started  as  a  campaign  ^A»per,  was  continued 
after  election,  and  was  highly  successful  as  a  weekly  journal. 
Its  issue  of  April  3,  1S41,  contained  the  announcement  of  the 
proposed  journal,  in  an  advertisement  as  follows: 

"NEW  -YORK  TRIBUNE. 

"  On  Saturday,  the  tenth  day  of  April  instant,  the  Subscriber  will  pub- 
lish the  first  number  of  a  New  Morning  Journal  of  Politics,  Literature, 
and  General  Intelligence. 

"The  Tribune,  as  its  name  imports,  will  labour  to  advance  the  interests 
of  the  People,  and  to  promote  their  Moral,  Social,  and  Political  well- 
being.  The  immoral  and  degrading  Police  Reports,  Advertisements,  and 
other  matter  which  have  been  allowed  to  disgrace  the  columns  of  our 
leading  Penny  Papers,  will  be  carefully  excluded  from  this,  and  no 
exertion  spared  to  render  it  worthy  of  the  hearty  approval  of  the  virtuous 
and  refined,  and  a  welcome  visitant  at  the  family  fireside. 

"Earnestly  believing  that  the  political  revolution  which  has  called 
William  Henry  Harrison  to  the  Chief  Magistracy  of  the  Nation  was  a 
triumph  of  Right  Reason  and  Public  Good  over  Error  and  Sinister  Ambi- 
tion, The  Tribune  will  give  to  the  New  Administration  a  frank  and 
cordial,  but  manly  and  independent  support,  judging  it  always  by  its  acts, 
and  commending  those  only  so  far  as  they  shall  seem  calculated  to 
subserve  the  great  end  of  all  government  —  the  welfare  of  the  People. 

"  The  Tribune  will  be  published  every  morning  on  a  fair  royal  sheet  — 
(size  of  The  Log-Cabin  and  Evening  Signal)  —  and  transmitted  to  its  city 
subscribers  at  the  low  price  of  one  cent  per  copy.  Mail  subscribers,  $4 
per  annum.  It  will  contain  the  news  by  the  morning's  Southern  Mail, 
which  is  contained  in  no  other  Penny  Paper.  Subscriptions  are  respect- 
fully  solicited  by  HORACE  GKEELEY,  30  Ann  St." 

The  welfare  of  the  People  —  such  was  believed  to  be  the  true 
object  of  government  by  Horace  Greeley;  to  teach  how  best 
to  bring  about  which  would  be  the  ruling  ambition,  the 
zealous,  conscientious  endeavour  of  The  Tribune.  The  editor 
did  not  propose  to  himself  to  be  neutral  in  politics  on  the  one 
hand,  nor  servile  to  party  on  the  other.  "  They  builded  better 
than  they  knew  "  is  true  of  most  refonners.  Mr.  Greeley  's 
main  object  was  to  infuse  into  political  journalism  independ- 
ence, free  discussion  .of  "  party  measures  "  by  the  papers 
sustaining  the  party,  the  right  of  individual  judgment.  He 
expressly  states  that  the  moving  consideration  with  him  in 
the  establishment  of  The  Tribune  was  political  —  the  elevation 
of  political  journalism  above  mere  partizanship,  which,  he 


112  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELET. 

thought,  would  be  best  for  the  party,  and  certainly  most 
conducive  to  the  welfare  of  the  people.    On  this  point  he  says : 

"  My  leading  idea  was  the  establishment  of  a  journal  removed  alike 
from  servile  partisanship  on  the  one  hand  and  from  gagged,  mincing 
neutrality  on  the  other.  Party  spirit  is  so  fierce  and  intolerant  in  this 
country  that  the  editor  of  a  non-partisan  sheet  is  restrained  from  saying 
what  he  thinks  and  feels  on  the  most  vital,  imminent  topics;  while,  on 
the  other  hand,  a  Democratic,  Whig,  or  Republican  journal  is  generally 
expected  to  praise  or  blame,  like  or  dislike,  eulogize  or  condemn,  in 
precise  accordance  with  the  views  and  interest  of  its  party.  I  believed 
there  was  a  happy  medium  between  these  extremes,  —  a  position  from 
which  a  journalist  might  openly  and  heartily  advocate  the  principles  and 
commend  the  measures  of  that  party  to  which  his  convictions  allied  him, 
yet  frankly  dissent  from  its  course  on  a  particular  question,  and  even 
denounce  its  candidates,  if  they  were  shown  to  be  deficient  in  capacity  or 
(far  worse)  in  integrity.  I  felt  that  a  journal  thus  loyal  to  its  guiding 
convictions,  yet  ready  to  expose  and  condemn  unworthy  condnct  or 
incidental  error  on  the  part  of  men  attached  to  its  party,  must  be  far  more 
effective,  even  party-wise,  than  though  it  might  always  be  counted  on  to 
applaud  or  reprobate,  bless  or  curse,  as  the  party's  prejudices  or  immediate 
interest  might  seem  to  prescribe.  Especially  by  the  Whigs  —  who  were 
rather  the  loosely  aggregated,  mainly  undisciplined  opponents  of  a  great 
party,  than,  in  the  stricter  sense,  a  party  themselves  —  did  I  feel  that  such 
a  journal  was  consciously  needed,  and  would  be  fairly  sustained.  I  had 
been  a  pretty  constant  and  copious  contributor  (generally  unpaid)  to 
nearly  or  quite  every  cheap  Whig  journal  that  had,  from  time  to  time, 
been  started  in  our  city ;  most  of  them  to  fail  after  a  very  brief,  and  not 
particularly  bright  career;  but  one  —  The  New- York  Whig,  which  was, 
throughout  most  of  its  existence,  under  the  dignified  and  conscientious 
direction  of  Jacob  B.  Moore,  formerly  of  The  New  Hampshire  Journal  — 
had  been  continued  through  two  or  three  years.  My  familiarity  with  ita 
history  and  management  gave  me  confidence  that  the  right  sort  of  a 
cheap  Whig  journal  would  be  enabled  to  live.  I  had  been  ten  years  in 
New- York,  was  thirty  years  old,  in  full  health  and  vigour,  and  worth,  I 
presume,  about  two  thousand  dollars,  half  of  it  in  printing  materials. 
The  Jeffersonian,  and  still  more  The  Log-Cabin,  had  made  me  favourably 
known  to  many  thousands  of  those  who  were  most  likely  to  take  such  a 
paper  as  I  proposed  to  make  The  Tribune,  while  The  New-Yorker  had 
given  me  some  literary  standing  and  the  reputation  of  a  useful  and  well- 
informed  compiler  of  election  returns.  In  short,  I  was  in  a  better  position 
to  undertake  the  establishment  of  a  daily  newspaper  than  the  great  mass 
of  those  who  try  it  and  fail,  as  most  who  make  the  venture  do  and  must. 
I  presume  the  new  journals  (in  English)  since  started  in  this  city  number 
not  less  than  one  hundred,  whereof  barely  two  —  The  Times  and  The 
World  — can  be  fairly  said  to  be  still  living:  and  The  World  is  a 
mausoleum  wherein  the  remains  of  The  Evening  Star,  The  American,  and 


THE  TJKIBUNE.  113 

The  Courier  and  Enquirer  lie  inurned ;  these  having  long  ago  swallowed 
sundry  of  their  predecessors.  Yet  several  of  those  which  have  meantime 
lived  their  little  hour  and  passed  away  were  conducted  by  men  of  decided 
ability  and  ripe  experience,  and  were  backed  by  a  pecuniary  capital  at 
least  twenty  times  greater  than  the  fearfully  inadequate  sum  whereon  I 
started  The  Tribune." 

"We  thus  perceive  that  the  primary  object  of  The  Tribune 
was  to  be  the  welfare  of  the  people;  the  secondary  object  the 
success  of  the  Whig  party.  And  this  was  the  reverse  of  the 
rule  of  the  partizan  organs,  whose  universal  practice  was  to 
sustain  "the  party,  right  or  wrong,"  than  which  a  more 
fearfully  vicious  and  demoralizing  course  could  not  be  devised. 
This  was  a  long  step  forward  in  political  journalism.  It  did 
not,  it  is  true,  place  that  journalism  upon  the  plane  of  judicial 
impartiality,  but  it  compelled  the  party  to  be  more  liberal  in 
idea,  more  just  and  honest  in  administration,  more  careful  in 
its  selections  of  representative  men.  It  banished  the  atrocious 
saying,  that  all  is  fair  in  politics;  and  compelled  the  represen- 
tatives of  the  party  to  account  to  the  body  politic  they 
represented,  instead  of  considering  themselves  masters. 

With  this  for  its  leading  idea  The  New- York  Tribune  first 
appeared  on  the  tenth  day  of  April,  1841.  It  was  retailed  for 
one  cent,  and  was  hardly  one-fourth  as  large  as  The  Tribune  is 
at  present,  even  when  it  is  without  supplement.  "  Not  much  of 
a  newspaper,"  says  Mr.  Greeley,  "  could  be  afforded  for  that 
price,  even  in  those  specie-paying  times."  The  day  upon  which 
The  Tribune  was  first  cried  by  the  newsboys  was  most  unsea- 
sonable, an  extremely  "raw"  day  of  cold,  sleet,  and  snow. 
Upon  this  day,  New-York  held  her  great  funeral  parade  in 
honour  of  the  late  President  Harrison.  The  chief  marshal  of 
this  parade,  General  Robert  Bogardus,  soon  aftenvaras  died  on 
account  of  exposure  to  the  inclemencies  of  the  scarcely  less 
than  terrible  weather.  Upon  such  an  untoward,  funereal  day,  it 
was  not  possible  that  any  considerable  number  of  copies  of  the 
new  journal  could  be-  sold.  About  five  hundred  subscribers 
had  been  obtained  for  the  paper,  however,  mainly  by  the  zeal- 
ous exertions  of  Mr.  Greeley's  warm  personal  and  political 
friends,  Mr.  Noah  Cook  and  Mr.  James  Coggeshall, — which 


114:  LIFE   OF  HORACE   OEKELET. 

were  delivered  by  carriers.  Of  the  first  number,  says  Mr. 
Greeley,  "I  printed  five  thousand,  and  nearly  succeeded  in 
giving  away  all  of  them  that  would  not  sell." 

Such  was  the  modest  manner  in  which  The  New- York  Trib- 
une was  ushered  into  the  world.  Mr.  Greeley  did  not  consider 
himself  worth  at  this  time  more  than  two  thousand  dollars, 
half  of  which  consisted  of  printing  materials.  Printers  will 
know  hence  that,  unless  he  had  gone  in  debt  for  it,  The  Tribune 
could  not  be  printed  in  The  Tribune  office.  Mr.  Greeley's 
whole  fortune  would  not  have  sufficed  to  buy  a  single  press  of 
capacity  to  work  off  the  paper.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  he  hired 
his  presswork  done  at  another  office  paying  therefor  so  much  a 
token — two  hundred  and  forty  sheets.  The  necessary  expenses 
of  the  office  were  about  $525  for  the  first  week.  The  receipts 
were  $92.  Surplus  of  outgo  over  income,  $433.  It  is  clear 
that  with  cash  in  hand  to  begin  with  of  only  one  thousand 
dollars,  this  venture,  at  this  rate,  would  soon  be  a  total  wreck. 
Mr.  Coggeshall,  above  mentioned,  voluntarily  loaned  Mr. 
Greeley  $1000,  which  enabled  him  to  move  on.  Moreover, 
though  the  expenses  inevitably  increased  with  the  improve- 
ments rapidly  made  upon  the  paper,  the  receipts  increased  at 
greater  ratio,  until  the  latter  nearly  equalled  the  former,  when 
an  event  of  rare  good  fortune  in  the  history  of  Mr.  Greeley 
occurred.  This  was  his  forming  a  partnership  in  the  publica- 
tion of  The  Tribune  with  Mr.  Thomas  McElrath.  When  Hor- 
ace Greeley  was  engaged  in  his  first  work  in  New- York — 
setting  up  that  terribly  lean  New  Testament,  at  West's,  on 
Chatham  Street,  it  will  be  recollected, — the  printing-office  was 
over  the  publishing  house  of  McElrath  &  Bangs,  the  senior  of 
which  firm  was  the  gentleman  of  whom  we  now  speak.  Young 
Greeley's  odd  ways  and  queer  costume  were  the  subject  of  much 
fun-making,  doubtless;  but  his  intelligence,  his  wit  and 
humour,  his  generosity  and  probity  were  equally  the  subject 
of  admiring  comment.  Mr.  McElrath,  a  very  unobtrusive, 
very  observing  man, — a  sort  of  silent  male  Jane  Eyre, — could 
hardly  fail  to  put  the  young  printer  from  the  country  down 
among  his  mental  memoranda,  with  an  eye  to  his  future  career. 
Mr.  McElrath  became  a  successful  lawyer,  and  as  such  was 


THOMAS  M'ELRATH.  115 

widely  and  favourably  known  when  Tlic  Tribune  appeared. 
But  Mr.  Greeley's  personal  acquaintance  with  him  had  been 
very  slight.  He  was  surprised,  therefore,  upon  receiving  a 
call  from  Mr.  McElratli  and  a  voluntary  proposition  from  him 
of  partnership  in  the  "  still  struggling  but  hopeful  enterprise." 
The  result  of  the  interview  is  described  by  Mr.  Greeley: 

"  He  offered  to  invest  two  thousand  dollars  as  an  equivalent  to  whatever 
1  had  in  the  business,  and  to  devote  his  time  and  energies  to  its  manage- 
ment, on  the  basis  of  perfect  equality  in  ownership  and  in  sharing  the 
proceeds.  This  I  very  gladly  accepted ;  and  from  that  hour  my  load  was 
palpably  lightened.  During  the  ten  years  or  over  that  The  Tribune  was 
issued  by  Greeley  &  McElrath,  my  partner  never  once  indicated  that  my 
anti-Slavery,  anti-Hanging,  Socialist,  and  other  frequent  aberrations  from 
the  straight  and  narrow  path  of  Whig  partisanship,  were  injurious  to  our 
common  interest,  though  he  must  often  have  sorely  felt  that  they  were  so; 
and  never,  except  when  I  (rarely)  drew  from  the  common  treasury  more 
money  than  could  well  be  spared,  in  order  to  help  some  needy  friend  whom 
he  judged  beyond  help,  did  he  even  look  grieved  at  anything  I  did.  On 
the  other  hand,  his  business  management  of  the  concern,  though  never 
brilliant,  nor  specially  energetic,  was  so  safe  and  judicious  that  it  gave  me 
no  trouble,  and  scarcely  required  of  me  a  thought,  during  that  long  era  of 
all  but  unclouded  prosperity." 

Mr.  Greeley  announced  the  partnership  in  fitting  terms  in     . 
The  Tribune  of  July  31st,  his  statement  being  followed  by 
that  of  Mr.  McElrath: 

"The  undersigned,  in  connecting  himself  with  the  conduct  of  a  public 
journal,  invokes  a  continuance  of  that  courtesy  and  good  feeling  which 
has  been  extended  to  him  by  his  fellow-citizens.  Having  heretofore 
received  evidence  of  kindness  and  regard  from  the  conductors  of  the  Whig 
press  in  this  city  and  rejoicing  in  the  friendship  of  most  of  them,  it  will 
be  his  aim  in  his  new  vocation  to  justify  that  kindness  and  strengthen  and 
increase  those  friendships.  His  hearty  concurrence  in  the  principles, 
Political  and  Moral,  on  which  The  Tribune  has  thus  far  been  conducted, 
has  been  a  principal  incitement  to  the  connection  here  announced;  and 
the  statement  of  this  fact  will  preclude  the  necessity  of  any  special  decla- 
ration of  opinions.  With  gratitude  for  past  favours,  and  an  anxious 
desire  to  merit  a  continuance  of  regard,  he  remains, 

The  Public's  humble  servant,          THOMAS  MCELKATH." 

It  will  thus  be  seen  that  in  the  opinion  of  Thomas  McElrath, 
The  Tribune  had  established  the  fact  that  it  had  principles, 
both  political  and  moral.  Herein  certainly  lay  one  of  the  rea- 


116  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

sons  of  its  success.  It  was  believed  by  many  that  the  other 
cheap  journals  of  the  city,  with  which  The  Tribune  chiefly 
came  into  competition,  were  not  largely  supplied  with  either 
the  one  or  the  other.  But  it  was  not  only  that  The  Tribune 
had  a  higher  political  and  moral  tone  than  its  rival  cheap-for- 
cash  journals  at  this  time,  but  because  of  other  good  reasons 
also,  that  it  was  greeted  by  many  warm  friends  from  the  begin- 
ning, whose  number  constantly  increased.  It  extended  hearty 
welcome  to  American  writers  and  thinkers,  generously  encour- 
aging literature.  It  cheerfully  welcomed  to  its  columns  the 
contributions  of  those  who  had  new  ideas,  popular  or  unpop- 
ular, claimed  to  be  of  practical  use  and  benefit  to  men. 
Herein  The  Tribune  was  not  circumscribed  by  the  lines  either 
of  party  or  of  creed.  It  would  blot  out  no  moral,  or  political, 
or  social  light,  let  its  rays  come  from  whatsoever  sphere  they 
might  It  cheerfully  extended  advocacy  to  any  idea  or  reform 
which  might  augment  the  welfare  of  the  people. 

Such  was  the  general  character,  affirmatively,  of  The  New- 
York  Tribune  from  the  beginning.  But  besides  these  causes 
tending  to  give  it  success,  it  gained  many  friends  among  the 
better  classes  of  community,  because  it  would  not  publish 
articles  and  advertisements  of  immoral  and  vicious  influence. 
Herein,  because  the  lines  were  not  drawn  at  all  by  some  other 
journals,  The  Tribune  doubtless  drew  them  too  tightly  at  first. 
Nevertheless,  as  the  times  then  were,  it  was  better  to  err  on 
the  side  of  too  much  rigidity  than  on  that  of  too  much  loose- 
ness. It  inaugurated  among  cheap  papers  an  era  of  Journal- 
istic Integrity,  and  was  respected  accordingly.  From  the 
moment  Mr.  McElrath  took  his  seat  in  the  counting-room  as 
business  manager,  Horace  Greeley  having  abundance  of 
capacity  to  manage  affairs  up  stairs,  The  New- York  Tribune 
was  a  great  success. 

A  quarter  of  a  century  after  he  had  founded  The  Tribune, 
Mr.  Greeley  gave  a  rapid  sketch  of  its  history  from  the 
beginning:: 

o  o 

"  The  Tribune,  as  it  first  appeared,  was  but  the  germ  of  wuat  I  sought 
to  make  it.  No  journal  sold  for  a  cent  could  ever  be  much  more  than  a 
dry  summarv  of  the  most  important  or  the  most  interesting  occurrences 


THE  TRIBUNE.  117 

of  the  day;  and  such  is  not  a  newspaper,  in  the  higher  sense  of  the  term. 
We  need  to  know,  not  only  what  is  done,  but  what  is  purposed  and  said, 
by  those  who  sway  the  destinies  of  states  and  realms;  and,  to  this  end, 
the  prompt  perusal  of  the  manifestoes  of  monarchs,  presidents,  ministers, 
legislators,  etc.,  is  indispensable.  No  man  is  even  tolerably  informed  in 
our  day  who  does  not  regularly  '  keep  the  run '  of  events  and  opinions, 
through  the  daily  perusal  of  at  least  one  good  journal;  and  the  ready  cavil 
that  'no  one  can  read'  all  that  a  great  modern  journal  contains,  only 
proves  the  ignorance  or  thoughtlessness  of  the  caviller.  No  one  person  is 
expected  to  take  such  an  interest  in  the  rise  and  fall  of  stocks,  the  markets 
for  cotton,  cattle,  grain,  and  goods,  the  proceedings  of  Congress,  Legisla- 
tures, and  Courts,  the  politics  of  Europe,  and  the  ever-shifting  phases  of 
Spanish-American  anarchy,  etc.,  etc.,  as  would  incite  him  to  a  daily 
perusal  of  the  entire  contents  of  a  metropolitan  city  journal  of  the  first 
rank.  The  idea  is  rather  to  embody  in  a  single  sheet  the  information 
daily  required  by  all  those  who  aim  to  keep  '  posted  '  on  every  important 
occurrence ;  so  that  the  lawyer,  the  merchant,  the  banker,  the  forwarder, 
the  economist,  the  author,  the  politician,  etc.,  may  find  here  whatever  he 
needs  to  see,  and  be  spared  the  trouble  of  looking  elsewhere.  A  copy  of 
a  great  morning  journal  now  contains  more  matter  than  an  average 
twelvemo  volume,  and  its  production  costs  far  more,  while  it  is  sold  for  a 
fortieth  or  fiftieth  part  of  the  volume's  price.  There  is  no  other  miracle 
of  cheapness  which  at  all  approaches  it.  The  Electric  Telegraph  has 
precluded  the  multiplication  of  journals  in  the  great  cities,  by  enormously 
increasing  the  cost  of  publishing  each  of  them.  The  Tribune,  for 
example,  now  pays  more  than  one  hundred  thousand  dollars  per  annum 
for  intellectual  labour  (reporting  included)  in  and  about  its  office,  and  one 
hundred  thousand  dollars  more  for  correspondence  and  telegraphing,  —  in 
other  words,  for  collecting  and  transmitting  news.  And,  while  its  income 
has  been  largely  increased  from  year  to  year,  its  expenses  have  inevitably 
been  swelled  even  more  rapidly;  so  that,  at  the  close  of  1866,  in,  which  its 
receipts  had  been  over  nine  hundred  thousand  dollars,  its  expenses  had 
been  very  nearly  equal  in  amount,  leaving  no  profit  beyond  a  fair  rent  for 
the  premises  it  owned  and  occupied.  And  yet  its  stockholders  were 
satisfied  that  they  had  done  a  good  business,  —  that  the  increase  in  the 
patronage  and  value  of  the  establishment  amounted  to  a  fair  interest  on 
their  investment,  and  might  well  be  accepted  in  lieu  of  a  dividend.  In 
the  good  time  coming,  with  cheaper  paper  and  less  exorbitant  charges  for 
'cable  despatches'  from  the  Old  World,  they  will  doubtless  reap  where 
they  have  now  faithfully  sown.  Yet  they  realize  and  accept  the  fact,  that 
a  journal  radically  hostile  to  the  gainful  arts  whereby  the  cunning  and 
powerful  few  live  sumptuously  without  useful  labour,  and  often  amass 
wealth,  by  pandering  to  lawless  sensuality  and  popular  vice,  can  never 
hope  to  enrich  its  publishers  so  rapidly  nor  so  vastly  as  though  it  had  a 
soft  side  for  the  Liquor  Traffic,  and  for  all  kindred  allurements  to  carnal 
appetite  and  sensual  indulgence. 
"  Fame  is  a  vapour;  popularity  an  accident;  riches  take  wings;  the  onlj 


118 


LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELET. 


earthly  certainty  is  oblivion ;  no  man  can  foresee  what  a  day  may  bring 
forth;  while  those  who  cheer  to-day  will  often  curse  to-morrow ;  and  yet 
I  cherish  the  hope  that  the  journal  I  projected  and  established  will  live 
and  flourish  long  after  I  shall  have  mouldered  into  forgotten  dust,  being 
guided  by  a  larger  wisdom,  a  more  unerring  sagacity  to  discern  the  right, 
though  not  by  a  more  unfaltering  readiness  to  embrace  and  defend  it  at 
whatever  personal  cost;  and  that  the  stone  which  covers  my  ashes  may 
bear  to  future  eyes  the  still  intelligible  inscription, '  Founder  of  The  New- 
York  Tribune.'  "» 

'  Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life,  p.  143. 


WILLIAM  CULLEN  BRYANT.— See  page  107. 


CHAPTEK   VIII. 

THE  TRIBUNE  — HISTORY— EDITORS  AND  CORRESPONDENTS. 

Early  Successes  of  The  Tribune  —  Contest  with  The  Sun  —  Henry  J.  Ray- 
mond,  First  Assistant  Editor — Establishment  of  The  Weekly  Tribune — 
Its  Remarkable  Success — The  Era  of  Newspaper  Expresses  —  Foreign 
News  and  Correspondence  —  Distinguished  Correspondents,  at  this 
Time  and  Afterwards,  of  The  Tribune  —  Bayard  Taylor;  Margaret 
Fuller;  Thomas  Hughes;  Emilio  Castelar;  M.  D.  Conway;  G.  W. 
Smalley ;  Kane  O'Donnell — Notable  Associate  Editors  of  The  Tribune — 
Charles  A.  Dana;  George  Ripley;  Solon  Robinson;  William  H.  Fry; 
George  M.  Snow;  and  Others  —  Hearty  Accord  of  All  with  Mr.  Gree- 
ley's  General  Views  —  A  Journal  Earnestly  Devoted  to  the  Welfare  of 
the  People  —  The  Fenimore  Cooper  Libel  Suits. 

THE  TRIBUNE  succeeded  in  commanding  the  general  respect 
and  in  constantly  gaining  substantial  friends,  from  its  first  num- 
ber. Two  things  it  is  necessary  for  a  positive,  progressive 
man  to  have,  in  order  that  he  may  be  stirred  to  achieve  the 
best  success.  These  are :  first-rate  friends ;  and  first-rate 
enemies.  In  effect,  such  a  man's  first-rate  enemies  are  his 
most  efficient  friends;  and  it  really  requires  very  little  grace 
for  a  genuinely  great  man  to  love  his  enemies.  It  is  often  but 
the  prompting  of  common  gratitude. 

Mr.  Greeley  had  only  fairly  got  The  Tribune  going,  suc- 
ceeding, however,  in  beating  his  rivals  in  some  matters  of 
important  intelligence,  when  the  conductors  of  The  Sun  made 
an  attempt  to  put  him  down  by  main  force  and  street  brawls. 
The  Evening  Signal,  then  edited  by  Mr.  Park  Benjamin,  told 
how  The  Sun  undertook  not  to  outshine,  but  to  crush  The 
Tribune: 

The  publisher  of  The  Sun  has,  during  the  past  few  days,  got  up  a 
conspiracy  to  crush  The  New- York  Tribune.  The  Tribune  was,  from  its 
inception,  very  successful,  and,  in  many  instances,  persons  in  the  habit  of 
taking  The  Sun,  stopped  that  paper  —  wisely  preferring  a  sheet  which 
gives  twice  the  amount  of  reading  matter,  and  always  contains  the  latest 

(119) 


t20  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GKEELEY. 

intelligence.  This  fact  afforded  sufficient  evidence  to  Beach,  as  it  did  to 
all  others  who  were  cognizant  of  the  circumstances,  that  The  Tribune 
would,  before  the  lapse  of  many  weeks,  supplant  The  Sun.  To  prevent 
this,  and,  if  possible,  to  destroy  the  circulation  of  The  Tribune  altogether, 
an  attempt  was  made  to  bribe  the  carriers  to  give  up  their  routes ;  for- 
tunately this  succeeded  only  in  the  cases  of  two  men  who  were  likewise 
carriers  of  The  Sun.  In  the  next  place,  all  the  newsmen  were  threatened 
with  being  deprived  of  The  Sun,  if,  in  any  instance,  they  were  found 
selling  The  Tribune.  But  these  efforts  were  not  enough  to  gratify  Beach. 
He  instigated  boys  in  his  office,  or  others,  to  whip  the  boys  engaged  in 
selling  The  Tribune.  No  sooner  was  this  fact  ascertained  at  the  office  of 
The  Tribune,  than  young  men  were  sent  to  defend  the  sale  of  that  paper. 
They  had  not  been  on  their  station  long,  before  a  boy  from  The  Sun  office 
approached  and  began  to  flog  the  lad  with  The  Tribune:  retributory 
measures  were  instantly  resorted  to ;  but  before  a  just  chastisement  was 
inflicted,  Beach  himself,  and  a  man  in  his  employ,  came  out  to  sustain 
their  youthful  emissary.  The  whole  matter  will,  we  understand,  be  sub- 
mitted to  the  proper  magistrates." 

The  proper  magistrates  in  this  case  were  the  public,  who 
took  sides  with  The  Tribune  in  large  numbers,  swelling  the 
list  of  regular  subscribers  in  the  city  from  three  to  four  hun- 
dred a  day.  This  was  the  magnificent  act  of  friendship  the 
first  great  enemy  of  The  Tribune  did  for  that  journal  before  it 
was  a  month  old.  Without  the  enemy,  all  its  friends  could 
not  have  done  so  much.  It  need  hardly  be  said  that  The 
Tribune  gave  back  the  blows  of  The  Sun,  but  not  in  street- 
brawl  fashion.  It  used  some  vigourous  English  in  expressing 
its  opinion  of  that  journal,  and  published  the  best  news  first. 

If  in  those  days  The  Tribune  were  a  little  boastful  in  its 
triumphs  over  an  enemy  who  had  descended  to  bullyism,  let  it 
be  remembered  that  Horace  Greeley  was  only  thirty  years  old. 
He  had  not  become  the  Philosopher  of  later  years.  But  he 
went  on,  working  hard,  and  succeeding  in  making  a  better 
and  better  paper  every  day.  The  early  success  of  The  Tribune 
cannot  be  better  shown  than  by  the  statement  that  the  increase 
of  its  sales  per  week  was  about  five  hundred  copies  until  they 
reached  ten  thousand,  which,  with  Mr.  McElrath  in  the  office, 
fairly  placed  the  journal  on  its  feet. 

Mr.  Greeley's  first  assistant-editor  on  The  Tribune  was 
Henry  J.  Raymond,  afterwards  the  distinguished  editor  of  The 
Daily  Times,  one  of  America's  most  noted  politicians,  one  of 


HENRY  J.    RAYMOND.  121 

the  world's  great  journalists.  When  in  college,  Mr.  Raymond 
had  contributed  a  number  of  essays  to  The  New-Yorker.  He 
was  graduated, — at  the  University  of  Vermont, — in  the  sum- 
mer of  1840,  being  then  about  twenty  years  of  age,  and 
returning  to  his  home  in  the  State  of  New  York,  entered 
zealously  into  the  "  Tippecanoe  "  campaign.  Mr.  Raymond 
may  be  said  to  have  been  born  a  politician.  He  made  a 
number  of  speeches  during  the  campaign,  and  entered  into 
joint  discussions  with  experienced  debaters,  acquitting  him- 
self in  all  with  great  credit.  After  the  election,  he  proceeded 
to  New- York,  where  he  was  for  a  time  "  adrift,"  turning  his 
hand  to  what  he  could  find  to  do :  reading  a  little  law,  writing 
a  little  for  The  New-Yorker,  but  unable  at  first  to  procure  a 
regular  situation.  He  asked  Mr.  Greeley  for  the  position  of 
assistant-editor,  but  it  was  at  the  time  filled.  He  did  some 
work  daily  in  the  office,  however,  for  which  he  received  very 
little  compensation;  just  that  much  more,  however,  whatsoever 
the  amount,  than  Mr.  Greeley  had  received  for  his  first  essays 
in  journalism.  At  length  Mr.  Raymond  advertised  for  a 
school  in  the  South,  and  while  awaiting  replies,  did  considera- 
ble work  on  The  New-Yorker.  Speaking  of  this  period  of 
his  life  he  says :  "  I  added  up  election  returns,  read  the 
exchanges  for  news,  and  discovered  a  good  deal  which  others 
had  overlooked;  made  brief  notices  of  new  books,  read  proof, 
and  made  myself  generally  useful.  At  the  end  of  about  three 
weeks  I  received  the  first  reply  to  my  advertisement,  offering 
me  a  school  of  thirty  scholars  in  North  Carolina.  I  told  Mr. 
Greeley  at  once  that  I  should  leave  the  city  the  next  morning. 
He  asked  me  to  walk  with  him  to  the  post-office,  whither  he 
always  went  in  person  to  get  his  letters  and  exchanges,  and 
on  the  way  inquired  where  I  was  going.  I  told  him  to  North 
Carolina  to  teach  a  school.  He  asked  me  how  much  they 
would  pay  me.  I  said  four  hundred  dollars  a  year.  'Oh,' 
said  he,  '  stay  here — I'll  give  you  that.'  And  this  was  my 
first  engagement  on  the  Press,  and  decided  the  whole  course 
of  my  life." 

When  The  Tribune  was  established,  Mr.  Raymond  was  made 
first  assistant-editor.    He  entered  upon  the  duties  with  great 


122  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GEEELEY. 

zeal  and  discharged  them  with  wonderful  efficiency.  Mr. 
Greelej  says:  "I  had  not  much  for  him  to  do  till  The  Tribune 
was  started;  then  I  had  enough;  and  I  never  found  another 
person,  barely  of  age  and  just  from  his  studies,  who  evinced 
so  much  and  so  versatile  ability  in  journalism  as  he  did. 
Abler  and  stronger  men  I  may  have  met;  a  cleverer,  readier, 
more  generally  efficient  journalist  I  never  saw.  He  remained 
with  me  eight  years,  if  my  memory  serves,  and  is  the  only 
assistant  with  whom  I  ever  felt  required  to  remonstrate  for 
doing  more  work  than  any  human  brain  and  frame  could  be 
expected  long  to  endure.  His  salary  was  of  course  gradually 
increased  from  time  to  time;  but  his  services  were  more 
valuable  in  proportion  to  their  cost  than  those  of  any  one  else 
who  ever  worked  on  The  Tribune." 

It  appears  from  Mr.  Maverick's  Life  of  Raymond,  that  Mr. 
Greeley's  memory  was  at  fault  in  regard  to  the  time  Mr.  Ray- 
mond remained  on  The  Tribune.  He  left  that  journal  and 
became  connected  with  The  Courier  and  Enquirer  in  1843. 
But  it  would  have  been  difficult  for  Mr.  Greeley  to  over- 
estimate the  service  rendered  him  and  his  journal  during  its 
first  two  years  by  Mr.  Raymond.  He  appears  to  have  helped 
in  almost  every  department  of  the  paper  and  to  have  infused 
his  dashing,  gentlemanly  spirit  into  all.  He  wrote  editorials; 
"scisstrsed"  from  the  exchanges;  prepared  much  literary 
matter,  including  notices  of  books;  reported  public  meetings; 
and,  in  fine,  made  himself  a  great  deal  more  than  "  generally 
useful."  He  was  very  particularly  useful  indeed.  His  salary 
was  only  eight  dollars  a  week  at  first.  That  Mr.  Greeley  did 
not  forthwith  more  than  double  it  was  doubtless  due  to  two 
facts:  First,  The  Tribune  was  paying  out  more  money  than 
it  was  receiving.  It  was  not  a  good  time  for  raising  salaries; 
and  he  himself  was  getting  none.  Secondly,  Mr.  Greeley  had 
himself  worked  for  very  inadequate  salary;  it  had  only  been  a 
few  years  since  he  would  have  gladly  laboured  at  his  trade 
" for  fifteen  dollars  a  month  and  board  or  even  less;"  it  had 
been  a  fewer  number  of  years  since,  not  earning  so  much  as 
Mr.  Raymond's  first  pay  on  The  Tribune,  he  had  nevertheless 
been  able  to  remit  money  to  his  father  on  the  frontier.  When, 


HENRY  J.    RAYMOND.  123 

therefore,  Mr.  Raymond,  who  had  actually  worked  himself 
sick,  declared  that  he  would  not  return  for  less  than  twenty 
dollars  a  week,  so  far  from  Mr.  Greeley's  momentary  surprise 
and  opposition  being  evidence  of  his  want  of  appreciation  of 
Mr.  Raymond's  services,  the  fact  that  he  at  once  acceded  to  the 
demand  conclusively  proves  the  contrary.  Twenty  dollars  a 
week  was  then  a  good  deal  of  money;  unquestionably  more 
than  the  Editor  received;  daily  journals  were  not  started  with 
an  immense  sinking-fund  in  bank.  Not  to  consider  the 
difference  in  circumstances  affecting  the  pay  of  writers 
between  the  time  when  The  Tribune  was  founded  on  Horace 
Greeley's  talents,  and  the  time  when  The  Times  was  estab- 
lished on  Henry  J.  Raymond's  talents  and  money  enough  to 
run  a  bank,  is  to  manifest  not  only  palpable  injustice  but 
palpable  stupidity  as  well. 

It  is  hardly  possible  that  Mr.  Greeley  could  have  found  an 
assistant  so  competent  greatly  to  aid  him  in  building  up  a 
paper  as  Mr.  Raymond.  And  this,  not  only  because  of  that 
gentleman's  great  abilities  as  a  journalist:  his  capacity  to 
write  remarkably  well  and  with  wonderful  rapidity  upon  a 
great  variety  of  topics:  but  because,  though  several  years 
younger  than  the  chief  editor,  he  had  far  more  varied  culture, 
and  was  much  better  acquainted  with  the  opinions,  habits, 
customs,  prejudices,  of  polite  society.  Mr.  Greeley  was  apt  to 
go  ahead  in  the  course  which  his  conscience  and  judgment 
pointed  out  as  right.  Mr.  Raymond  considered  it  the  part  of 
wisdom  to  pay  some  deference  to  the  opinions  of  others,  right 
or  wrong;  and  he  esteemed  as  essentially  correct  some  things 
in  established  society  which  Mr.  Greeley  regarded  as  essentially 
vicious.  In  short,  the  conservative  element  lacking  in  Mr. 
Greeley  was  abundant  in  Mr.  Raymond,  who  gave  The  Tribune 
much  of  its  popularity  in  the  city  of  New- York  among  the 
cultivated  and  fashionable  classes.  He  had  great  respect  for 
Christianity,  as  represented  by  what  is  commonly  called 
orthodoxy.  Mr.  Greeley  was  decidedly  heterodox.  In  the 
then  existing  state  of  journalism,  Mr.  Raymond  was,  it  will 
thus  be  seen,  as  valuable  an  adviser  to  the  editor  of  The 
Tribune  as  he  could  have  obtained.  It  will  certainly  not  be 


124:  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

claimed  that  Mr.  Raymond  was  a  better  representative  of  the 
moral  elements  in  community  than  Mr.  Greeley,  in  nis  own 
lite  and  character,  but  he  certainly  was  less  pugnacious.  He 
did  not  push  unpopular  opinions,  regardless  of  consequences. 
His  policy,  his  amiability  were  invaluable  to  Mr.  Greeley  at 
this  particular  juncture;  and  his  brilliant  genius  as  a  journalist 
would  have  incalculably  benefitted  any  journal  at  any  time. 
This  was  shown  by  his  subsequent  career  on  The  Courier  and 
Enquirer,  and  by  the  magnificent  success  which  he  achieved 
on  The  New- York  Times.  And  so,  what  with  Greeley 's 
trenchant  blows,  and  Raymond's  politic  leaders,  and  the 
wonderful  hard  work  of  both,  almost  accomplishing  miracles, 
The  Tribune  went  on  conquering  and  to  conquer. 

In  the  Autumn  of  1841,  The  New-Yorker  and  The  Log- 
Cabin  were  discontinued.  In  their  stead  appeared  The  Weekly 
Tribune.  This  was  made  up  from  the  daily,  at  first;  the  selec- 
tions of  articles,  news,  etc.,  being  made  with  great  care,  the 
whole  designed  for  popular  reading.  It  was,  like  The  Daily 
Tribune,  a  success  from  the  start,  and  in  the  course  of  a  few 
years  gained  a  circulation  and  influence  throughout  the 
country  not  then  nor  since  approached  by  any  political  jour- 
nal. Every  city,  town,  and  village,  every  country  post-office 
had  its  "  club,"  in  some  cases  many  clubs,  of  subscribers  to 
The  Weekly  Tribune.  Its  circulation  subsequently  became 
some  three  hundred  thousand,  and  its  rates  of  advertising  the 
highest  that  had  ever  been  known.  No  weekly  journal,  con- 
nected with  a  daily,  was  ever  half  so  successful  as  this;  no 
newspaper  was  ever  so  influential  with  the  people.  If  The 
Log-Cabin  had  not  made  Mr.  Greeley's  name  familiar  in  all 
parts  of  the  country,  The  Weekly  Tribune  would  have  done  it. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  it  became  a  sort  of  never-ending  "  cam- 
paign paper";  a  political  gospel  for  vast  numbers  of  people; 
and  yet  it  was  ever  and  anon  advocating  "  isms  "  which  were 
unpopular,  and  never  had  any  of  the  old-fashioned  subserviency 
to  party.  During  the  continuance  of  the  Whig  party,  it  was 
independently  Whig,  with  undisguised  "  free-soil "  tendencies. 
In  the  interregnum  of  parties  between  the  final  overthrow  of 
the  Whigs  by  the  defeat  of  1852  aud  the  organization  of  the 


KEWS  BY   SPECIAL  EXTKESS.  125 

Republican  party,  it  was  almost  fiercely  independent, — going 
strong  against  prevailing  know-nothingism, —  but  greatly 
aided  in  the  formation  of  the  party  which  made  its  first  gen- 
eral engagement  in  1856,  and  won  its  first  national  victory 
four  years  afterwards  in  the  election  of  Abraham  Lincoln  to 
the  Presidency. 

Before  the  days  of  the  electric  telegraph,  there  were  many 
news  expresses,  whereby  public  journals  were  enabled  to 
furnish  intelligence  of  current  events  in  advance  of  the  mails. 
It  is  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  this  species  of  enterprise 
originated  with  the  cheap  dailies.  Before  their  existence,  The 
New- York  Journal  of  Commerce  regularly  received  its  news 
from  Washington  by  its  own  express,  beating  the  mail  many 
hours.  The  time  between  Washington  and  New- York  was 
twenty  hours.  There  were  twenty-four  relays  of  horses.  The 
speed  was  about  as  good  as  the  original  speed  of  railway 
trains  on  the  old-fashioned  flat  rails.  Other  journals  had 
adopted  the  plan  on  important  special  occasions;  and  those  of 
Boston  long  received  news  of  elections  throughout  all  Massa- 
chusetts in  this  way.  The  enterprise  was  suffered  to  languish, 
however,  and,  so  far  as  New- York  was  concerned,  to  become 
obsolete.  The  fierce  rivalry  growing  out  of  the  establishment 
of  the  penny  press  revived  it.  There  were  expresses  by  horses, 
by  rail,  by  steamboat,  by  ocean  steamer.  Between  Albany  and 
New- York,  the  steamboats  often  carried  compositors,  with 
well-filled  cases,  to  set  up  matter  supplied  by  reporters  on 
board,  or  who  had  given  the  Albany  news  up  to  the  moment 
of  a  boat's  departure.  Between  Halifax  and  New- York  this 
news-express  rivalry  was  greatest.  A  single  express  messenger 
sometimes  came  through  using  horses,  railway  engines,  and 
Sound  steamers — all  under  newspaper  "  charter  " — on  different 
parts  of  the  route.  At  length  a  vessel  was  fitted  out  and 
sailed  to  Europe  and  return  for  news  for  The  Tribune  and 
associated  journals.  The  expense  of  these  expresses  was 
enormous,  but  the  result  was  profit  to  the  papers,  and  their 
general  steady  improvement  both  in  the  quantity  and  quality 
of  their  current  intelligence.  One  of  the  greatest  triumphs 
of  The  Tribune  in  this  special  express  enterprise  was  achieved 


126  LIFE  OF  HORACE   GREELEY. 

by  Mr.  ^Raymond.     It  was  thus  related  after  Mr.  Raymond's 
death: 

"  Before  the  days  of  the  telegraph,  Raymond  was  sent  to  Boston  to 
report  a  speech  of  Daniel  "Webster,  then  in  the  height  of  his  popularity. 
Rival  city  journals  also  despatched  their  reporters,  each  selecting  for  the 
purpose  two  of  their  best  short-hand  writers  to  work  against  Mr.  Ray- 
mond. The  speech  was  delivered,  and  proved  to  be  one  of  Mr.  "Webster's 
greatest  achievements.  The  several  New- York  reporters  took  the  night- 
boat  to  return  to  New- York,  and  all,  save  Mr.  Raymond,  gave  themselves 
up  to  such  enjoyment  during  the  evening  as  the  boat  afforded.  Mr.  Ray- 
mond sat  quietly  in  the  back  cabin,  and  was  observed  to  be  writing 
furiously.  Presently  one  of  the  reporters  had  his  suspicions  aroused,  and 
setting  out  on  an  exploring  expedition,  found  that  Mr.  Raymond  had  on 
board  a  small  printing-office,  fully  equipped.  His  manuscript  was  taken 
page  by  page  to  the  compositors,  set  up  immediately,  and  on  the  arrival 
of  the  boat  in  New- York,  at  five  o'clock  in  the  morning,  Mr.  Raymond's 
report,  making  several  columns  of  The  Tribune,  was  all  in  type.  These 
columns  were  put  into  the  forms  at  once,  and  the  readers  of  that  journal 
were,  at  six  A.  M.,  served  with  a  full  report  of  Daniel  Webster's  speech 
delivered  in  Boston  on  the  previous  afternoon.  This,  at  that  time,  was 
one  of  the  greatest  journalistic  feats  on  record,  and  so  completely 
astonished  and  astounded  The  Tribune's  rivals  that  they  never  published 
the  reports  furnished  by  their  short-hand  writers,  but  acknowledged  them- 
selves fairly  beaten." 

Those  who  were  not  readers  of  public  journals  during  the 
era  of  the  newspaper  expresses  can  hardly  imagine  how  ardent 
was  the  rivalry;  how  exultant  was  the  victor;  how  chagrinned 
the  defeated.  It  may  now  be  said  without  fear  of  provoking 
wrath,  that  there  was  no  little  "  sharp  practice "  all  around, 
and  that  in  the  average  one  journal  was  about  as  often 
victorious  as  another.  The  notable  diiference  between  The 
Tribune  and  The  Herald  was  that,  when  The  Tribune  did 
happen  to  be  beaten,  it  owned  up  more  ingenuously  than  its 
cotemporary.  In  thi*  kind  of  news  The  Herald  always  was 
very  slow  indeed. 

The  foreign  news  brought  by  each  steamship  made  a  gala- 
day  for  the  great  journals,  of  course.  It  was  customary  then 
— and  still  is  with  some  of  them — to  give  a  summary  of  the 
news  in  display  headings,  which  sometimes  were  so  magnifi- 
cently displayed  as  to  occupy  more  space  than  the  news!  A 
collection  of  these  headings  would  make  a  curious  and  instruct- 


THOMAS  HUGHES.  127 

ive  volume.  The  ha'penny-worth  of  news  to  the  monstrous 
deal  of  headings  was  the  exception,  not  the  rule. 

The  attention  given  to  foreign  news  by  The  Tribune, 
especially  to  European  intelligence,  was  ever  very  great.  Its 
editorials  upon  current  events  in  that  continent,  literature,  poli- 
tics, were  carefully  prepared  by  competent  writers.  Early  in 
its  history,  it  employed  correspondents  familiar  with  affairs, 
who  unquestionably  gave  its  readers  from  time  to  time  far 
more  full  and  faithful  accounts  of  events  than  any  European 
journal  ever  presented  of  American  affairs.  It  will  not  be 
forgotten  that  the  now  distinguished  author,  Mr.  Bayard  Tay- 
lor, achieved  his  first  marked  success  as  a  correspondent  of 
The  Tribune.  The  most  successful  of  Americans  among 
writers  of  travels,  he  is  also  eminent  as  poet,  novelist,  and 
lecturer;  but  his  "Views  A-Foot," — which  first  appeared  in 
the  form  of  letters  to  The  Tribune, — is  even  yet  regarded  by 
many  as  his  most  pleasing  work.  Mr.  Greeley  himself,  as  we 
shall  presently  see,  visited  Europe  in  1851,  and  thence  contrib- 
uted to  his  journal  a  series  of  letters  of  uncommon  interest. 
But  before  this  Margaret  Fuller,  whom  Mr.  Greeley  described 
as  "  the  loftiest,  bravest  soul  that  has  yet  irradiated  the  form 
of  an  American  woman,"  wrote  at  irregular  intervals  a  num- 
ber of  letters  to  The  Tribune  such  as  she  only  could  write. 

It  is  worthy  of  remark  that  The  Tribune  afterwards  had  on 
its  corps  of  regular  correspondents  some  of  the  most  illustri- 
ous minds  of  Europe.  For  several  years  Mr.  Thomas  Hughes 
quite  regularly  wrote  letters  to  The  Tribune  from  London. 
He  thus  gave  incalulable  value  and  interest  to  that  journal 
among  thoughtful  men,  during  that  momentous  period  of 
reform  in  British  law  which  resulted  in  a  beneficent  triumph 
of  religious  freedom,  great  extension  of  the  right  of  voting, 
the  elevation  of  such  radical  reformers  and  noble  philanthro- 
pists to  the  the  control  of  the  English  government  as  William 
Gladstone  and  John  Bright.  Eminent  in  this  peaceful  revo- 
lution was  Mr.  Hughes,  who  was  for  some  years  a  member  of 
the  House  of  Commons.  It  need  not  be  stated  to  the  intelli- 
gent that  the  name  of  this  great  reformer  of  British  politics 
stands  high  in  English  literature.  The  author  of  "School- 


128  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELET. 

Days  at  Rugby"  and  "Tom  Brown  at  Oxford"  will  scarcely 
be  forgotten  till  the  proudest  monuments  of  English  learning 
shall  have  crumbled  into  ruins. 

Still  later  in  The  Tribune's  history  did  it  have  among  its 
regular  European  correspondents  one  of  the  most  illustrious 
orators  and  statesmen  of  Spain.  I  refer  to  Emilio  Castelar, 
subsequently  distinguished  as  Secretary  of  State  for  Foreign 
Affairs  in  the  cabinet  of  the  Republic,  proclaimed  upon  the 
abdication  of  King  Amadeus.  His  wonderful  eloquence  might 
persuade  us  that,  after  long  and  weary  and  suffering  journey- 
ings,  his  country  had  come  in  view  of  a  heroic  era,  if  not  in 
possession.  The  outpourings  of  his  stirring  oratory  are  not 
more  grand  than  his  meditations  are  comprehensive,  thorough, 
and  wise.  His  contributions  to  The  Tribune  were  of  the 
highest  interest  and  the  greatest  value.  Other  distinguished 
Europeans  have  been  on  the  corresponding  corps  of  The 
Tribune. 

And,  again,  after  our  American  civil  war,  and  when  Mexico, 
in  consequence  of  the  interference  of  European  governments 
in  her  behalf,  had  become,  after  the  death  of  Maximilian,  a 
scene  of  world-wide  interest,  The  Tribune  sent  thither  a 
special  correspondent,  whose  careful  letters,  over  the  signature 
of  "  K.  O'D."  furnished  the  reading  world  with  reliable  intel- 
ligence, and  had  great  influence  in  disabusing  the  public  mind 
of  erroneous  opinions  in  regard  to  the  Republic  and  President 
Juarez.  These  notable  letters  were  written  by  Mr.  Kane 
O'Donnell,  a  gentleman  of  rare  genius  and  talents  and  culti- 
vated taste;  a  man  of  touching  modesty  but  of  heroic  courage, 
who  fell  a  victim  to  the  dread  disease  of  consumption,  just  as 
he  reached  the  prime  of  manhood  and  might  soon  have 
attained  the  general  recognition  of  his  great  abilities  and  his 
culture. 

The  London  letters  of  The  Tribune  have  always  been  of  the 
highest  merit.  Mr.  G-.  W.  Sm alley  has  for  some  time  had  charge 
of  the  bureau  there.  His  letters  and  dispatches  have  long  been, 
among  the  most  attractive  contributions  to  The  Tribune.  The 
Rev.  M.  D.  Conway  has  also  for  some  years  contributed  to  The 
Tribune  from  London  letters  both  of  intelligential  and  literary 


GOVERNMENT.  129 

value.  But  not  to  multiply  instances,  it  is  undoubtedly  true 
that  during  the  late  Franco-Prussian  war,  The  New- York 
Tribune  supplied  the  public  with  the  best,  most  accurate,  most 
elaborate  reports  of  events  as  they  transpired.  By  this  means, 
the  American  people  were  furnished  with  intelligence  of  the 
most  momentous  events  transpiring  in  Europe  before  the  peo- 
ple of  Europe  were.  It  is  universally  conceded,  I  believe,  that 
the  enterprise  of  The  Tribune  herein  was  the  greatest  achieve- 
ment of  the  kind  with  which  modern  journalism  is  credited. 

But  much  of  this  is  anticipation.  I  have  thought  it  propel 
to  state  the  general  facts  here,  as  not  out  of  logical,  though 
somewhat  out  of  chronological,  order.  The  foreign  corres- 
pondence early  inaugurated  by  The  Tribune  soon  comprehended 
most  portions  of  the  world.  It  is  especially  noteworthy  that 
wherever  humanity  struggled  against  oppression ;  wherever  a 
contest  was  being  waged  for  freedom,  for  labour,  for  progress; 
wherever  the  people  rose  against  unjust  law  and  wicked  sys- 
tems,— there  The  New- York  Tribune  was  sure  to  have  its 
representative,  who  represented  alike  that  journal  and  the  wel- 
fare of  the  people.  Thus  The  Tribune  came  to  be  regarded  as 
representative  in  America  of  genuine  republicanism,  and  was 
as  such  esteemed  by  the  republicans  of  other  lands,  whilst 
some  other  American  journals  were  petted  and  puffed  by  the 
friends  of  monarchy,  aristocracy,  and  the  upholders  of  injustice. 

Let  us  now  return  to  The  Tribune  at  home  and  take  a  view 
of  its  immediate  control. 

It  is  to  be  observed,  in  the  first  place,  that  the  government 
of  a  newspaper  must  of  necessity  be  essentially  autocratic. 
Otherwise  it  would  be  at  cross  purposes  with  itself  one  day 
with  another,  or  even  on  the  same  day,  and  become  a  laughing- 
stock. Such  fate  of  journals  is  not  unheard  of.  But,  secondly, 
one  who  is  fit  to  write  for  a  great  journal,  must  needs  have  a 
high  degree  of  intellectual  self-respect,  and  will  not  become 
one  of  "  the  corps,"  unless  regard  be  shown  to  his  opinions 
and  judgment.  He  will  not  degrade  himself,  nor  let  any  one 
degrade  him,  to  the  rank  of  a  "Bohemian," — which,  I  take  it, 
is  about  the  lowest  grade  to  which  the  human  intellect  can  be 
reduced,  unless,  indeed,  it  be  the  grade  so  crowded  by  the 
9 


130  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GEEELET. 

Jenkinses.  As  it  requires  many  minds  to  prodnce  a  great 
journal,  we  have,  then,  a  necessity  of  absolute  government  arid 
of  the  most  liberal  judgment  on  the  part  of  The  Editor. 
There  are  few  men  capable  of  successfully  filling  this  anoma- 
lous position,  so  that  there  are  at  least  a  hundred  excellent  edi- 
torial writers  to  one  excellent  editor.  Mr.  Greeley  was  exceed- 
ingly wise,  or  wonderfully  fortunate  in  the  selection  of  his 
assistant  and  associate  editors. 

Mr.  Charles  A.  Dana  was  the  first  who  held  the  rank  of 
"  managing  editor  "  on  The  Tribune  staff.  He  became  editor- 
ially connected  with  the  paper  not  very  long  after  its  establish- 
ment. At  this  time  Mr.  Dana  was  a  Socialist  who  believed  in 
reforming  things  from  the  foundation.  A  man  of  liberal 
culture,  enthusiastic  nature,  untiring  energy;  a  brilliant,  dash- 
ing writer  upon  a  great  variety  of  topics;  with  a  fine  genius 
for  journalism;  he  won  the  hearty  affection  and  high  admira- 
tion of  Mr.  Greeley,  and,  I  believe,  retained  both,  until  he  so 
widely  differed  with  his  chief  editor  in  regard  to  the  policy  the 
paper  should  pursue,  that  he  retired  in  1861,  being  succeeded 
by  Mr.  Gay.  Our  country  has  produced  few  more  accom- 
plished journalists  than  Charles  A.  Dana;  not  one,  perhaps, 
who  has  done  so  much  editorial  work  in  addition  to  other 
important  and  influential  intellectual  labour,  except  Mr. 
Greeley  and  Mr.  Raymond. 

Associated  with  Mr.  Dana  in  the  corps  editorial  of  The 
Tribune  during  the  whole  period  of  his  management,  was  Mr. 
George  Ripley,  connected  with  Mr.  Dana  also,  as  is  well  known, 
in  editing  the  New  American  Cyclopedia.  Mr.  Ripley  has  for 
many  years  been  the  literary  editor  of  The  Tribune, — a  depart- 
ment which  he  has  made  of  surpassing  value  to  the  intelligent 
public  and  a  powerful  means  of  instructing  and  elevating  the 
general  taste. 

Mr.  Solon  Robinson,  author  of  "  Hot  Corn,"  was  long  the 
editor  of  the  agricultural  department  of  The  Tribune, — a 
department  in  which  Mr.  Greeley  unquestionably  took  as  much 
interest  as  he  did  in  any  except  that  of  news  and  of  politics. 
If  the  real  service  rendered  to  the  country  by  The  New- York 
Tribune  in  the  way  of  increasing  the  knowledge  and  adding 


TRIBUNE   \VKTTEKS.  131 

to  the  honourable  ambition  of  the  farmers  of  the  republic 
were  weighed  in  the  balance  with  that  of  the  "governmental 
bureau  at  Washington,  called  the  Agricultural  Department, 
the  latter  would  instantly  kick  the  beam.  "We  have  had  few 
agricultural  editors  who  have  so  ably  combined  interest  with 
practical  value  in  their  essays  and  reports  as  Solon  Robinson. 

During  Mr.  Dana's  management,  Bayard  Taylor  was  also  at 
times  on  the  staff.  One  of  the  most  efficient  writers  among  the 
associate  editors  was  William  II.  Fry,  the  distinguished  musi- 
cian and  musical  qritic.  He  was  also  a  forcible  writer  of 
political  articles,  a  man  heartily  hating  all  forms  of  injustice, 
and  capable  of  expressing  his  ideas  in  terse,  classical,  elegant 
English,  and  sometimes  leaving  a  lasting  sting  in  the  wounds 
he  made.  The  money  articles  by  Mr.  George  M.  Snow  were 
ever  greatly  valued  by  the  circles  which  those  articles  are 
mainly  designed  to  serve. 

Others  then  or  since  distinguished  as  journalists  were  Mr. 
Greeley's  associate-editors  during  the  period  in  which  Mr. 
Dana  was  managing-editor.  Men  who  during  these  years  were 
of  The  Tribune  staff  have  since  become  distinguished  in 
departments  of  government,  in  diplomacy,  in  science,  and  in 
letters.  Mr.  Dana  himself,  it  will  be  recollected,  was  assistant 
Secretary  of  War  under  the  great  War  Secretary,  Edwin  M. 
Stanton,  and  greatly  aided  him  in  organizing  victory  for  the 
Union  arms.  Fitz  Henry  Warren  became  a  Brigadier-General, 
and  after  the  war  represented  the  republic  in  a  foreign  land. 
Mr.  Harvey,  who  some  time  represented  the  United  States  near 
Lisbon,  had  been  in  charge  of  The  Tribune  bureau  at  Wash- 
ington. 

But  not  now  further  to  anticipate,  it  may  be  gathered  from 
what  has  been  set  forth  as  to  the  history  of  the  journal  foun- 
ded and  conducted  by  Horace  Greeley,  that  it  became  a  great 
establishment  within  a  few  years  after  the  stormy,  dark  and 
dreary  day  on  which  it  made  its  first  appearance.  At  the  head 
of  it  was  he  who  came  to  be  confessedly  the  greatest  of  jour- 
nalists. He  had  about  him,  as  his  Lieutenant  and  his  editorial 
associates,  men  of  notable  intellectual  power,  of  vast  and 
varied  accomplishments,  of  reformatory  spirit;  all  devoted  to 


132  LIFE   OF    HORACE   GREELEY. 

tlieir  chief,  with  singular  affection,  even  more  devoted  to  The 
Tribune,  if  possible.  And  they  all  knew  that  he  was  more 
devoted  to  The  Tribune  than  he  was  to  himself.  The  journal, 
as  we  have  seen,  was  in  every  respect  enterprising.  It  had 
correspondents  in  different  parts  of  the  republic,  and  a  well- 
organized  bureau  at  the  National  Capital.  Moreover,  the 
character  of  The  Tribune  was  such  that  it  ever  had  an  army 
of  volunteer  contributors  among  the  thoughtful  men  and 
women  of  the  country.  A  new  idea  did  not  start  it  from  its 
propriety;  and  we  have  never  had  a  journal  so  conspicuously 
noted  for  fair-play.  Thus,  without  injuriously  abridging  intel- 
ligence of  current  events,  it  surpassed  its  cotemporaries  in 
intelligence  of  current  thought,  more  especially  the  thought 
of  the  general  body  politic, — of  the  common  people,  as  we  say. 
Mr.  Coleridge,  had  he  lived  to  see  the  sight,  might  have  said 
The  New- York  Tribune  was  a  very  great  newspaper  both 
objectively  and  subjectively.  It  gave  the  best  accounts  of 
things  taking  place  in  the  world  without  and  the  world  within. 
Many  minds  of  all  countries  paid  their  willing  tribute  to  The 
Tribune,  not  only  because  of  its  own  enterprise,  but  because 
from  its  origin  its  paramount  object  was  plainly  manifest — the 
welfare  of  the  people.  Of  its  conflicts  in  this  behalf,  of  its 
"isms"  which  were  unpopular,  of  its  visions  which  have 
become  beneficent  realities,  we  shall  have  occasion  to  speak  as 
we  go  along  the  journey  of  The  Editor's  life. 

Here,  it  may  be  well  enough  to  relate  an  account  of  Mr. 
Greeley's  connexion  with  libel  suits,  one  series  of  which  grew 
'jut  of  criticism  in  The  Tribune  on  the  novelist,  J.  Fenimore 
Cooper.  Mr.  Greeley  remarks  in  his  "  Kecollections,"  that 
"  editorial  life  has  many  cares,  sundry  enjoyments,  with  certain 
annoyances;  and  prominent  among  these  last  are  libel-suits. 
I  can  hardly  remember  a  time  when  I  was  absolutely  exempt 
from  these  infestations.  In  fact,  as  they  seem  to  be  a  main 
reliance  for  support  of  certain  attorneys,  destitute  alike  of 
character  and  law,  I  suppose  they  must  be  borne  for  an 
indefinite  period." 

The  most  notable  libel-suit  in  which  Mr.  Greeley  became 
involved  was  with  the  distinguished  novelist  just  named,  and 


THE   FENIMORE   COOPER   LIBEL- SUITS.  133 

this  not  very  long  after  the  founding  of  The  Tribune.  Mr 
Cooper  had  long  resided  abroad,  and  during  this  absence  from 
home,  unless  nature  had  originally  bestowed  them  upon  him, 
had  acquired  aristocratic  feelings  and  arrogant  bearing,  the 
former  of  which  were  sufficiently  manifested  in  his  works 
"Homeward  Bound,"  and  "Home  as  Found."  A  Western 
journalist,  since  a  Senator  of  the  United  States,  might  have 
said  that  Mr.  Cooper  had  become  a  member  of  "  the  cat-fish 
aristocracy."1  He  became  involved  in  difficulties  with  his 
neighbours,  and  a  newspaper  of  the  village  of  Cooperstowu 
took  up  the  quarrel,  berating  the  novelist  with  no  little  vigour. 
Mr.  Cooper  brought  an  action  for  libel,  recovered  judgment, 
and  collected  the  money  by  means  rather  harsh  than  otherwise. 
A  number  of  journals  now  took  up  the  cudgels  and  belaboured 
the  novelist  rather  heavily  and  lively.  Among  them  was  The 
Albany  Evening  Journal,  edited  by  Tliiirlow  Weed,  who,  with 
others,  was  drawn  into  libel-suits.  Mr.  Weed,  by  reason  of 
sickness  in  his  family,  did  not  attend  court  so  promptly  as  lie 
should  have  done,  whereupon  a  judgment  for  $400  was  entered 
up  against  him.  Mr.  Weed  sent  to  The  Tribune  the  following 
account  of  the  case: 

"  MR.  FENIMORE  COOPER  AND  HIS  LIBELS. 

"  FONDA,  Nov.  17,  1841. 
"To  THE  EDITOK  OP  THE  TRIBUNE:  — 

"The  Circuit  Court  now  sitting  here  is  to  be  occupied  chiefly  with  the 
legal  griefs  of  Mr.  Fenimore  Cooper,  who  has  determined  to  avenge  him- 
self upon  the  Press  for  having  contributed  by  its  criticisms  to  hia  waning 
popularity  as  a  novelist. 

"The  'handsome  Mr.  Efflngham'  has  three  cases  of  issue  here,  two  of 
which  are  against  Col.  Webb,  Editor  of  The  Courier  and  Enquirer,  and 
one  against  Mr.  Weed,  Editor  of  The  Albany  Evening  Journal. 

"  Mr.  Weed  not  appearing  on  Monday  (the  first  day  of  court),  Cooper 
moved  for  judgment  by  default,  as  Mr.  Weed's  counsel  had  not  arrived. 
Col.  Webb,  who  on  passing  through  Albany,  called  at  Mr.  Weed's  house, 
and  learned  that  his  wife  was  seriously  and  his  daughter  dangerously  ill, 
requested  Mr.  Sacia  to  state  the  facts  to  the  Court,  and  ask  a  day's  delay. 
Mr.  Sacia  made,  at  the  same  time,  an  appeal  to  Mr.  Cooper's  humanity. 
But  that  appeal,  of  course,  was  an  unavailing  one.  The  novelist  pushed 

1 1  refer  to  the  Hon.  J.  J.  Ingalls,  Senator  from  Kansas,  who,  I  believe, 
originated  the  expression  quoted. 


UFE   OF   HORACE  GEEELEY. 

bis  advantage.  The  Court,  however,  ordered  the  cause  to  go  over  till  the 
next  day,  with  the  understanding  that  the  default  should  be  entered  then 
if  Mr.  Weed  did  not  appear.  Col.  Webb  then  despatched  a  messenger  to 
Mr.  Weed  with  this  information.  The  messenger  returned  with  a  letter 
from  Mr.  Weed,  stating  that  his  daughter  lay  very  ill,  and  that  he  would 
not  leave  her  while  she  was  suffering  or  in  danger.  Mr.  Cooper,  therefore, 
immediately  moved  for  his  default.  Mr.  Sacia  interposed  again  for  time, 
but  it  was  denied.  A  jury  was  empanelled  to  assess  Mr.  Effingham's 
damages.  The  trial,  of  course,  was  ex-parte,  Mr.  Weed  being  absent  and 
defenceless.  Cooper's  lawyer  made  a  wordy,  windy,  abusive  appeal  for 
exemplary  damages.  The  jury  retired,  under  a  strong  charge  against  Mr. 
Weed  from  Judge  Willard,  and  after  remaining  in  their  room  till  twelve 
o'clock  at  night,  sealed  a  verdict  for  $400  for  Mr.  Effingham,  which  was 
delivered  to  the  Court  this  morning. 

"This  meager  verdict,  under  the  circumstances,  is  a  severe  and  mortify, 
ing  rebuke  to  Cooper,  who  had  everything  his  own  way. 

"The  value  of  Mr.  Cooper's  character,  therefore,  has  been  judicially 
ascertained. 

"  It  is  worth  exactly  four  hundred  dollars. 

"  Col.  Webb's  trial  comes  on  this  afternoon ;  his  counsel,  A.  L.  Jordan, 
Esq.,  having  just  arrived  in  the  up  train.  Cooper  will  be  blown  sky  high. 
This  experiment  upon  the  Editor  of  The  Courier  and  Enquirer,  I  predict, 
will  cure  the  '  handsome  Mr.  Effingham '  of  his  monomania  for  libels." 

It  was  not  revealed  until  long  afterwards  that  Mr.  Weed 
wrote  the  letter,  but  for  its  publication  in  The  Tribune  Mr. 
Cooper  forthwith  brought  an  action  of  libel  against  Messrs. 
Greeley  and  McElrath.  The  cause  came  on  to  be  tried  at 
Ballston,  Saratoga  county,  in  December,  1842.  Because  he 
judged  that  there  were  a  number  of  matters  in  the  law  of  litel 
which  appealed  more  directly  and  forcibly  to  the  experience  of 
Editors  than  of  Lawyers,  Mr.  Greeley  appeared  as  his  own 
counsel  in  the  case.  He  gave  a  full,  somewhat  humourous 
report  of  the  trial  in  The  Tribune,  from  which  we  make  full 
extracts: 

"The  case  was  opened  to  the  Court  and  Jury  by  Richard  Cooper,  nephew 
and  attorney  of  the  plaintiff,  in  a  speech  of  decided  pertinence  and  force. 
*  *  *  Mr.  R.  Cooper  has  had  much  experience  in  this  class  of  cases, 
and  is  a  young  man  of  considerable  talent.  His  manner  is  the  only  fault 
about  him,  being  too  elaborate  and  pompous,  and  his  diction  too  bom- 
bastic  to  produce  the  best  effect  on  an  unsophisticated  auditory.  If  he 
will  only  contrive  to  correct  this,  he  will  yet  make  a  figure  at  the  Bar — or 
rather,  he  will  make  less  figure  and  do  more  execution.  The  force  of  hia 
speech  was  marred  by  Feniniore's  continually  interrupting  to  dictate  and 


THE   FENIMORE   COOPER   LIBEL-SUITS.  135 

suggest  to  him  ideas  when  he  would  have  done  much  better  if  left  alone. 
For  instance:  Fenimore  instructed  him  to  say,  that  our  letter  from  Fonda 
above  recited  purported  to  be  from  the  '  correspondent  of  The  Tribune,' 
and  thence  to  draw  and  press  on  the  Jury  the  inference  that  the  letter  was 
written  by  some  of  our  own  corps,  whom  we  had  sent  to  Fonda  to  report 
these  trials.  This  inference  we  were  obliged  to  repel  in  our  reply,  by 
showing  that  the  article  plainly  read  '  correspondence  of  The  Tribune,' 
j  ust  as  when  a  fire,  a  storm,  or  some  other  notable  event  occurs  in  any 
part  of  the  country  or  world,  and  a  friend  who  happens  to  be  there,  sits 
down  and  despatches  us  a  letter  by  the  first  mail  to  give  us  early  advices, 
though  he  has  no  connection  with  us  but  by  subscription  and  good  will, 
and  perhaps  never  wrote  a  line  to  us  in  his  life  till  now. 

**********         *         ** 

"  The  next  step  in  Mr.  R.  Cooper's  opening:  We  had,  to  the  declaration 
against  us,  pleaded  the  General  Issue  —  that  is  NotGuilty'of  libelling  Mr. 
Cooper,  at  the  same  time  fully  admitting  that  we  had  published  all  that 
he  called  our  libels  on  him,  and  desiring  to  put  in  issue  only  the  fact  of 
their  being  or  not  being  libels,  and  have  the  verdict  turn  on  that  issue. 
But  Mr.  Cooper  told  the  Jury  (and  we  found,  to  our  cost,  that  this  was 
New  York  Supreme  and  Circuit  Court  law)  that  by  pleadiny  Not  Guilty  we 
had  legally  admitted  ourselves  to  be  Guilty  —  that  all  that  was  necessary  for 
the  plaintiff  under  that  plea  was  to  put  in  our  admission  of  publication, 
and  then  the  Jury  had  nothing  to  do  but  to  assess  the  plaintiffs  damages 
under  the  direction  of  the  Court.  In  short,  we  were  made  to  understand 
that  there  was  no  way  under  Heaven  —  we  beg  pardon;  under  New  York 
Supreme  Court  Law — in  which  the  editor  of  a  newspaper  could  plead  to 
an  action  for  libel  that  the  matter  charged  upon  him  as  libelous  was  not 
in  its  nature  or  intent  a  libel,  but  simply  a  statement,  according  to  thp 
best  of  his  knowledge  and  belief,  of  some  notorious  and  every  way  pul^.o 
transaction,  or  his  own  honest  comments  thereon;  and  ask  the  Jury  to 
decide  whether  the  plaintiffs  averment  or  his  answers  thereto  be  the 
truth!  To  illustrate  the  beauties  of 'the  perfection  of  human  reason'  — 
always  intending  New  York  Circuit  and  Supreme  Court  reason  —  on  this 
subject,  and  to  show  the  perfect  soundness  and  pertinence  of  Mr.  Cooper's 
logic  according  to  the  decisions  of  these  Courts,  we  will  give  an  example. 

"  Our  police  reporter,  say  this  evening,  shall  bring  in  on  his  chronicle 
of  daily  occurrences  the  following: 

"'A  hatchet-faced  chap,  with  mouse-coloured  whiskers,  who  gave  the 
name  of  John  Smith,  was  brought  in  by  a  watchman  who  found  h:in 
lying  drunk  in  the  gutter.  After  a  suitable  admonition  from  the  Justice, 
and  on  payment  of  the  usual  fine,  he  was  discharged.' 

"  Now,  our  reporter,  who,  no  more  than  we,  ever  before  heard  of  this 
John  Smith,  is  only  ambitious  to  do  his  duty  correctly  and  thoroughly,  to 
make  his  description  accurate  and  graphic,  and  perhaps  to  protect  better 
nvn  who  rejoice  in  the  cognomen  of  John  Smith,  from  being  confounded 
with  this  one  in  the  popular  rumour  of  his  misadventure.  If  the  paragraph 
should  come  under  our  notice,  we  should  probably  strike  it  out  altogether, 


136  LIFE   OF   HOJKACE   GREELET. 

as  relating  to  a  subject  of  no  public  moment,  and  likely  to  crowd  out 
better  matter.  But  we  do  not  see  it,  and  in  it  goes :  Well :  John  Smith, 
who  '  acknowledges  the  corn  '  as  to  being  accidentally  drunk  and  getting 
into  the  watch-house,  is  not  willing  to  rest  under  the  imputation  of  being 
hatchet-faced  and  having  mouse-coloured  whiskers,  retains  Mr.  Richard 
Cooper  —  for  he  could  not  do  better  —  and  commences  an  action  for  libel 
against  us.  We  take  the  best  legal  advice,  and  are  told  that  we  must 
demur  to  the  Declaration — that  is,  go  before  a  court  without  jury,  where 
no  facts  can  be  shown,  and  maintain  that  the  matter  charged  as  uttered  by 
us  is  not  libelous.  But  Mr.  R.  Cooper  meets  ua  there  and  says  justly: 
4  How  is  the  court  to  decide  without  evidence  that  this  matter  is  not  libel- 
oua?  If  it  was  written  and  inserted  for  the  express  purpose  of  ridiculing 
and  bringing  into  contempt  my  client,  it  clearly  is  libelous.  And  then  as 
to  damages :  My  client  is  neither  rich  nor  a  great  man,  but  his  character, 
in  his  own  circje,  is  both  dear  and  valuable  to  him,  We  shall  be  able  to 
show  on  trial  that  he  was  on  the  point  of  contracting  marriage  with  the 
daughter  of  the  keeper  of  the  most  fashionable  and  lucrative  oyster-cellar 
in  Orange  street,  whose  nerves  were  so  shocked  at  the  idea  of  her  intended 
having  a  '  hatchet  face  and  mouse-coloured  whiskers,'  that  she  fainted  out- 
right on  reading  the  paragraph  (copied  from  your  paper  into  the  next 
day's  Sun),  and  was  not  brought  to  until  a  whole  bucket  of  oysters  which 
she  had  just  opened  had  been  poured  over  her  in  a  hurried  mistake  for 
water.  Since  then,  she  has  frequent  relapses  and  shuddering,  especially 
when  my  client's  name  is  mentioned,  and  utterly  refuses  to  see  or  speak 
of  him.  The  match  is  dead  broke,  and  my  client  loses  thereby  a  capital 
home,  where  victuals  are  more  plentiful  and  the  supply  more  steady  than 
it  has  been  his  fortune  to  find  them  for  the  last  year  or  two.  He  loses, 
with  all  this,  a  prospective  interest  in  the  concern,  and  is  left  utterly  with- 
out  business  or  means  of  support  except  this  suit.  Besides,  how  can  you 
tell,  in  the  absence  of  all  testimony,  that  the  editor  was  not  paid  to  insert 
this  villianous  description  of -my  client,  by  some  envious  rival  for  the 
affections  of  the  oyster-maid,  who  calculates  both  to  gratify  his  spite  ana 
advance  his  lately  hopeless  wooing?  In  that  case,  it  certainly  is  a  libel. 
We  affirm  this  to  be  the  case,  and  you  are  bound  to  presume  that  it  is. 
The  demurrer  must  be  overruled.'  And  so  it  must  be.  No  judge  could 
decide  otherwise. 

"  Now  we  are  thrown  back  upon  a  dilemma :  Either  we  must  plead 
Justification,  in  which  case  we  admit  that  our  publication  was  on  its  face  a 
libel;  and  now,  woe  to  us  if  we  cannot  prove  Mr.  Cooper's  client's  face  as 
sharp,  and  his  whiskers  of  the  precise  colour  as  stated.  A  shade  more  or 
tess  rains  us.  For,  be  it  known,  by  attempting  a  Justification  we  have 
not  merely  admitted  our  offense  to  be  a  libel,  but  our  plea  is  an,  aggravation 
of  tJif,  libel,  and  entitles  the  plaintiff  to  recover  higher  and  more  examplary 
damages.  But  we  have  just  one  chance  more :  to  plead  the  general  iswie — 
to-wiT,  that  we  did  not  libel  the  said  John  Smith,  and  go  into  court  pre- 
pared to  show  that  we  had  no  malice  toward  or  intent  to  injure  Mr.  Smith. 
never  heard  of  him  before,  and  have  done  all  we  know  how  to  make  him 


THE  FENIMOKE   COOPER   LIBEL-SUTTS.  137 

reparation  —  in  short,  that  we  have  done  and  intended  nothing  which 
brings  us  fairly  within  the  iron  grasp  of  the  law  of  libel.  But  here  again, 
while  trying  our  best  to  get  in  somehow  a  pleu  of  Not  Guilty,  we  have 
actually  pleaded  Guilty! — so  says  the  Supreme  Court  law  of  New  York — 
our  admitted  publication  (no  matter  of  what)  concerning  John  Smith 
proves  irresistibly  that  we  have  libelled  him — we  are  not  entitled  in  any 
way  whatever  to  go  to  the  Jury  with  evidence  tending  to  show  that  our 
publication  is  not  a  libel — or,  in  overthrow  of  the  legal  presumption  of 
malice,  to  show  that  there  actually  was  none.  All  that  we  possibly  can 
offer  must  be  taken  into  account  merely  in  mitigation  of  damages.  Our 
hide  is  on  the  fence,  you  see,  any  how. 

"  But  to  return  to  Richard's  argument  at  Ballston.  He  put  very  strongly 
against  us  the  fact  that  our  Fonda  correspondent  (see  Declaration  above) 
considered  Fenimore's  verdict  there  a  meager  one.  'Gentlemen  of  the 
jury,'  said  he,  '  see  how  these  editors  rejoice  and  exult  when  they  get  off 
with  so  light  a  verdict  as  $400 !  They  consider  it  a  triumph  over  the  law 
and  the  defendant.  They  don't  consider  that  amount  anything.  If  you 
mean  to  vindicate  the  laws  and  the  character  of  my  client,  you  see  you 
must  give  much  more  than  this.'  This  was  a  good  point,  but  not  quite 
fair.  The  exultation  over  the  '  meager  verdict '  was  expressly  in  view  of 
the  fact  that  the  cause  was  undefended — that  Fenimore  and  his  counsel  had 
it  all  their  own  way,  evidence,  argument,  charge,  and  all.  Still,  Richard 
had  a  good  chance  here  to  appeal  for  a  large  verdict,  and  he  did  it  well 

"  On  one  other  point  Richard  talked  more  like  a  cheap  lawyer  and  less 
like  a — like  what  we  had  expected  of  him — than  through  the  general 
course  of  his  argument.  In  his  pleadings,  he  had  set  forth  Horace 
Greeley  and  Thomas  McElrath  as  Editors  and  Proprietors  of  The  Tribune, 
and  we  readily  enough  admitted  whatever  he  chose  to  assert  about  us 
except  the  essential  thing  in  dispute  between  us.  Well,  on  the  strength 
of  this  he  puts  it  to  the  Court  and  Jury,  that  Thomas  McElrath  is  one  of 
the  Editors  of  The  Tribune,  and  that  he,  being  (having  been)  a  lawyer, 
would  have  been  in  Court  to  defend  this  suit,  if  there  was  any  valid 
defense  to  be  made.  This,  of  course,  went  very  hard  against  us;  and  it 
was  to  no  purpose  that  we  informed  him  that  Thomas  McElrath,  though 
legally  implicated  in  it,  had  nothing  to  do  practically  with  this  matter — 
(all  which  he  knew  very  well  long  before) — and  that  the  other  defendant 
is  the  man  who  does  whatever  libelling  is  done  in  The  Tribune,  and  holds 
himself  everywhere  responsible  for  it.  We  presume  there  is  not  much 
doubt  even  so  far  off  as  Cooperstown  as  to  who  edits  The  Tribune,  and 
who  wrote  the  editorial  about  the  Fonda  business.  (In  point  of  fact,  the 
real  and  palpable  defendant  in  this  suit  never  even  conversed  with  his 
partner  a  quarter  of  an  hour  altogether  about  this  subject,  considering  it 
entirely  his  own  job;  and  the  plaintiff  himself,  in  conversation  with  Mr. 
McElrath,  in  the  presence  of  his  attorney,  had  fully  exonerated  Mr.  M. 
from  anything  more  than  legal  liability.)  But  Richard  was  on  his  legs  aa 
a  lawyer — he  pointed  to  the  seal  on  his  bond — and  therefore  insisted  that 
Thomas  McElrath  was  art  and  part  in  the  alleged  libel,  not  only  legally.. 


138  LIFE   OF    HOKACE   GREELEY. 

but  actually,  and  would  have  been  present  to  respond  to  it  if  he  had 
deemed  it  susceptible  of  defense!  As  a  lawyer,  we  suppose  this  was 
right;  but,  as  an  Editor  and  a  man,  we  could  not  have  done  it." 

Mr.  Greeley  followed  the  younger  Cooper  in  a  speech  which 
would  have  done  credit  to  an  experienced  lawyer.  "  Gentle- 
men of  the  Jury,"  he  concluded,  "  my  character,  my  reputation 
are  in  your  hands.  I  think  I  may  say  that  I  commit  them  to 
your  keeping  untarnished;  I  will  not  doubt  that  you  will 
return  them  to  me  unsullied.  I  ask  of  you  no  mercy,  but 
justice.  I  have  not  sought  this  issue;  but  neither  have  I 
feared  nor  shunned  it.  Should  you  render  the  verdict  against 
me,  I  shall  deplore  far  more  than  any  pecuniary  consequence 
the  stigma  of  libeller  which  your  verdict  would  tend  to  cast 
upon  me — an  imputation  which  I  was  never,  till  now,  called 
to  repel  before  a  jury  of  my  countrymen.  But  gentlemen, 
feeling  no  consciousness  of  deserving  such  a  stigma, — feeling 
at  this  moment,  as  ever,  a  profound  conviction  that  I  do  not 
deserve  it,  I  shall  yet  be  consoled  by  the  reflection  that  many 
nobler  and  worthier  than  I  have  suifered  far  more  than  any 
judgment  here  could  inflict  on  me  for  the  rights  of  free  speech 
and  opinion — the  right  of  rebuking  oppression  and  meanness 
in  the  language  of  manly  sincerity  and  honest  feeling.  By 
their  example,  may  I  still  be  upheld  and  strengthened. 
Gentlemen,  I  fearlessly  await  your  decision." 

It  is  clear  from  this  that  he  supposed  the  verdict  would  be 
against  him.  He  proceeds  with  his  report  of  the  trial: 

"  Mr.  J.  Fenimore  Cooper  summed  up  in  person  the  cause  for  the  prose- 
cution. He  commenced  by  giving  at  length  the  reasons  which  had  induced 
him  to  bring  this  suit  in  Saratoga.  The  last  and  only  one  that  made  any 
impression  on  our  mind  was  this,  that  he  had  heard  a  great  deal  of  good 
of  the  people  of  Saratoga,  and  wished  to  form  a  better  acquaintance  with 
them.  (Of  course  this  desire  was  very  flattering;  but  we  hope  the  Sarato- 
gans  won't  feel  too  proud  to  speak  to  common  folks  hereafter,  for  we  want 
liberty  to  go  there  again  next  summer.) 

"  Mr.  Cooper  now  walked  into  the  Public  Press  and  .its  alleged  abuses, 
arrogant  pretensions,  its  interference  in  this  case,  probable  motives,  etc. 
but  the  public  are  already  aware  of  his  sentiments  respecting  the  Press, 
and  would  not  thank  us  to  recapitulate  them.  His  stories  of  editors  pub- 
lishing truth  and  falsehood  with  equal  relish  may  have  foundation  in 
individual  cases,  but  certainly  none  in  general  practice.  No  class  of  men 


THE  FENIMORE   COOPER"  LIBEL-SUITS.  139 

spend  a  tenth  part  so  much  time  or  money  in  endeavouring  to  procure  the 
earliest  and  best  information  from  all  quarters,  as  it  is  their  duty  to  do. 
Occasionally  an  erroneous  or  utterly  false  statement  gets  into  print  and  is 
copied — for  editors  cannot  intuitively  separate  all  truth  from  falsehood — 
but  the  evil  arises  mainly  from  the  circumstance  that  others  than  editors 
are  often  the  spectators  of  events  demanding  publicity;  since  we  cannot 
tell  where  the  next  man  is  to  be  killed,  or  the  next  storm  rage,  or  the  next 
important  cause  to  be  tried :  if  we  had  the  power  of  prophecy,  it  would 
then  be  time  to  invent  some  steam-lightning  balloon,  and  have  a  reporter 
ready  on  the  spot  the  moment  before  any  notable  event  should  occur.  This 
would  do  it;  but  now  we  luckless  editors  must  too  often  depend  on  the 
observation  and  reports  of  those  who  are  less  observant,  less  careful, 
possibly  in  some  cases  less  sagacious,  than  those  of  our  own  tribe.  Our 
limitations  are  not  unlike  those  of  Mr.  Weller,  Junior,  as  stated  while 
under  cross-examination  in  the  case  of  Bardell  v.  Pickwick : 

"  '  Yes,  I  have  eyes,'  replied  Sam,  '  and  that's  just  it.  If  they  was  a  pair 
of  patent  double  million  magnifyin'  gas  microscopes  of  hextra  power, 
p'raps  I  might  be  able  to  see  through  a  flight  of  stairs  and  a  deal  door,  but 
bein'  only  eyes,  you  see,  my  wisiou's  limited.' 

"Fenimore  proceeded  to  consider  our  defense,  which  he  used  up  in  five 
minutes,  by  pronouncing  it  no  defence  at  all !  It  had  nothing  to  do  with 
the  matter  in  issue  whatever,  and  we  must  be  very  green  if  we  meant  to 
be  serious  in  offering  it.  (We  were  rather  green  in  Supreme  Court  libel 
law,  that's  a  fact;  but  we  were  put  to  school  soon  after,  and  have  already 
run  up  quite  a  little  bill  for  tuition,  which  is  one  sign  of  progress.)  His 
Honour  the  Judge  would  tell  the  Jury  that  our  law  was  no  law  whatever,  or 
had  nothing  to  do  with  this  case.  (So  he  did — Cooper  was  right  here.) 
In  short,  our  speech  could  not  have  been  meant  to  apply  to  this  case,  but 
was  probably  the  scrapings  of  our  editorial  closet — mere  odds  and  ends — 
what  the  editors  call  '  Balaam.'  Here  followed  a  historical  digression, 
concerning  what  editors  call  '  Balaam,'  which,  as  it  was  intended  to  illus- 
trate the  irrelevancy  of  our  whole  argument,  we  thought  very  pertinent.  It 
wound  up  with  what  was  meant  for  a  joke  about  Balaam  and  his  ass, 
which  of  course  was  a  good  thing ;  but  its  point  wholly  escaped  us,  and  we 
believe  the  auditors  were  equally  unfortunate.  However,  the  wag  himself 
appreciated  and  enjoyed  it. 

"There  were  several  other  jokes  (we  suppose  they  were)  uttered  in  the 
course  of  this  lively  speech,  but  we  didn't  get  into  their  merits  (probably 
not  being  in  the  best  humor  for  joking);  but  one  we  remembered  because 
it  was  really  good,  and  came  down  to  our  comprehension.  Fenimore  was 
replying  to  our  remarks  about  the  'handsome  Mr.  Efflngham  '  (see speech), 
when  he  observed  that  if  we  sTiould  sue  him  for  libel  in  'pronouncing  us 
not  handsome,  he  should  not  plead  the  General  Issue,  but  Justify.'1  That 
was  a  neat  hit,  and  well  planted.  "We  can  tell  him,  however,  that  if  the 
Court  should  rule  as  hard  against  him  as  it  does  against  editors  when  they 
undertake  to  justify,  he  would  find  it  difficult  to  get  in  the  testimony  to 
establish  a  matter  even  so  plain  as  our  plainness. 


14:0  TJira   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 


"  Feniniore  now  took  up  the  Fonda  libel  suit,  and  fought  the  whole  bat- 
tle over  again,  from  beginning  to  end.  Now  we  had  scarcely  touched  on 
this,  supposing  that,  since  we  did  not  justify,  we  could  only  refer  to  the 
statements  contained  in  the  publications  put  in  issue  between  us,  and  that 
the  Judge  would  check  us,  if  we  went  beyond  these.  Feniinore,  however, 
had  no  trouble  ;  said  whatever  he  pleased  —  much  of  which  would  have 
been  very  pertinent  if  he,  instead  of  we,  had  been  on  trial  —  showed  that  he 
did  not  believe  anything  of  Mr.  Weed's  family  being  sick  at  the  time  of 
the  Fonda  Trials,  why  he  did  not,  &c.,  <&c.  We  thought  he  might  have 
reserved  all  this  till  we  got  down  to  dinner,  which  everybody  was  now 
hungry  for,  and  where  it  would  have  been  more  in  place  than  addressed  to 
the  Jury. 

"Knowing  what  we  positively  did  and  do  of  the  severe  illness  of  the 
wife  of  Mr.  Weed,  and  the  dangerous  state  of  his  eldest  daughter  at  the 
time  of  the  Fonda  Trials  in  question  —  regarding  them  as  we  do  —  the  jokes 
attempted  to  be  cut  by  Fenimore  over  their  condition  —  his  talk  of  the 
story  growing  up  from  one  girl  to  the  mother  and  three  or  four  daughters 
—  his  fun  about  their  probably  having  the  Asiatic  cholera  among  them  or 
some  other  contagious  disease,  &c.,  &c.,  however  it  may  have  sounded  to 
others,  did  seem  to  us  rather  inhu  -  Hallo  there!  we  had  like  to  have  put 
our  foot  right  into  it  again,  after  all  our  tuition.  We  mean  to  say,  consid- 
ering that,  just  the  day  before,  Mr.  Weed  had  been  choked  by  his  counsel 
into  surrendering  at  discretion  to  Fenimore,  being  assured  (correctly)  by 
said  counsel  that,  as  the  law  is  now  expounded  and  administered  by  the 
Supreme  Court,  he  had  no  earthly  choice  but  to  bow  his  neck  to  the  yoke, 
pay  all  that  might  be  claimed  of  him  and  publish  whatever  humiliations 
should  be  required,  or  else  prepare  to  be  immediately  ruined  by  the  suits 
which  Fenimore  and  Richard  had  already  commenced  or  were  getting 
ready  for  him  —  considering  all  this,  and  how  much  Mr.  Weed  has  paid 
and  must  pay  towards  his  subsistence  —  how  keenly  W.  has  had  to  smart 
for  speaking  his  mind  of  him  —  we  did  not  think  that  Fenimore's  talk  at 
this  time  and  place  of  Weed's  family,  and  of  Weed  himself  as  a  man  so 
paltry  that  he  would  pretend  sickness  in  his  family  as  an  excuse  to  keep 
away  from  Court,  and  resort  to  trick  after  trick  to  put  off  his  case  for  a 
day  or  two  —  it  seemed  to  us,  considering  the  present  relation  of  the  parties, 
most  ungen  -  There  we  go  again  !  We  mean  to  say  that  the  whole  of 
this  part  of  Mr.  Cooper's  speech  grated  upon  our  feelings  rather  harshl}'. 
We  believe  that  isn't  a  libel.  (This  talking  with  a  gag  in  the  mouth  is 
rather  awkward  at  first,  but  we'll  get  the  hang  of  it  in  time.  Have  patience 
with  us,  Fenimore  on  one  side  and  the  Public  on  the  other,  till  we  nick  it.) 
********* 

"  Personally,  Fenimore  treated  us  pretty  well  on  this  trial—  let  us  thank 
him  for  that  —  and  so  much  the  more  that  he  did  it  quite  at  the  expense  of 
his  consistency  and  his  logic.  For,  after  stating  plumply  that  he-  con. 
sidered  us  the  best  of  the  whole  Press-gang  he  had  been  fighting  with,  he 
yet  went  on  to  argue  that  all  we  had  done  and  attempted  with  the  intent 
of  rendering  him  strict  justice,  had  been  in  aggravation  of  our  original 


THE   FENIMORE  COOPER   LIBEL-  SUITS.  141 

trespass !  Yt  s,  there  he  stood,  saying  one  moment  that  we  were,  on  the 
whole,  rather  a  clever  fellow,  and  every  other  arguing  that  we  had  done 
nothing  but  to  injure  him  wantonly  and  maliciously  at  first,  and  then  all 
in  our  power  to  aggravate  that  injury!  (What  a  set  the  rest  of  us  must 
be!) 

"  And  here  is  where  he  hit  us  hard  for  the  first  time.  He  had  talked 
over  an  hour  without  gaining,  as  we  could  perceive,  an  inch  of  ground. 
When  his  compliment  was  put  in,  we  supposed  he  was  going  on  to  say  he 
\\  as  satisfied  with  our  explanation  of  the  matter  and  our  intentions  to  do 
him  justice,  and  would  now  throw  up  the  case.  But  instead  of  this  he 
took  a  sheer  the  other  way,  and  came  down  upon  us  with  the  assertion 
that  our  publishing  his  statement  of  the  Fonda  business  with  our  com- 
ments, was  an  aggravation  of  our  original  offence — was  in  effect  adding 
insult  to  injury! 

********* 

"  There  was  a  little  point  made  by  the  prosecution  which  seemed  to  us 
too  little.  Our  Fonda  letter  had  averred  that  Cooper  had  three  libel-suits 
corning  off  there  at  that  Circuit — two  against  Webb,  one  against  Weed. 
Richard  and  Fenimore  argued  that  this  was  a  lie — the  one  against  Weed  was 
all.  The  nicety  of  the  distinction  here  taken  will  be  appreciated  when  we 
explain  that  the  suits  against  Webb  were  indictments  for  libels  on  J.  Feni- 
more Cooper! 

"  We  supposed  that  Fenimore  would  pile  up  the  law  against  us,  but  were 
dlssappointed.  He  merely  cited  the  last  ca«e  decided  against  an  Editor  by 
the  Supreme  Court  of  this  State.  Of  course,  it  was  very  fierce  against 
Editors  and  their  libels,  but  did  not  strike  us  as  at  all  meeting  the  issuo 
we  had  raised,  or  covering  the  grounds  on  which  this  case  ought  to  have 
been  decided. 

"Fenimore  closed  very  effectively  with  an  appeal  for  his  character,  and  a 
picture  of  the  sufferings  of  his  wife  and  family — his  grown-up  daughter* 
often  suffused  in  tears  by  these  attacks  on  their  father.  Some  said  thia 
was  mawkish,  but  we  consider  it  good,  and  think  it  told.  We  have  a  dif- 
ferent theory  as  to  what  the  girls  were  crying  for,  but  we  won't  state  it  lest 
another  dose  of  Supreme  Court  law  be  administered  to  us.  (Not  any  more 
at  present,  I  thank  ye.) 

"  Fenimore  closed  something  before  two  o'clock,  having  spoken  over  an 
hour  and  a  half.  If  he  had  not  wasted  so  much  time  in  promising  to  make 
but  a  short  speech  and  to  close  directly,  he  could  have  got  through  consid- 
erably sooner.  Then  he  did  wrong  to  Richard  by  continually  recurring  to 
and  fulsome  eulogiums  on  the  argument  of  'my  learned  kinsman.' 
Richard  had  made  a  good  speech  and  an  effective  one — no  mistake  about 
it — and  Fenimore  must  mar  it  first  by  needless,  provoking  interruptions, 
and  then  by  praises  which,  though  deserved,  were  horribly  out  of  place 
and  out  of  taste.  Fenimore,  my  friend,  you  and  I  had  better  abandon  the 
Bar — we  are  not  likely  either  of  us  to  cut  much  of  a  figure  there.  Let  us 
quit  before  we  make  ourselves  ridiculous. 

"  His  Honour  Judge  Willard  occupied  a  brief  half  hour  in  charging  the 


142  LIFE   OF   HORACE   OREELET. 

Jury.  We  could  not  decently  appear  occupied  in  taking  down  this  Charge, 
and  no  one  else  did  it — so  we  must  speak  of  it  with  great  circumspection. 
That  he  would  go  dead  against  us  on  the  Law  of  the  case  we  knc-w  right 
well,  from  his  decisions  and  charges  on  similar  trials  before.  Not  having 
his  Law  points  before  us,  we  shall  not  venture  to  speak  of  them.  Suffice 
it  to  say,  that  they  were  New  York  Supreme  and  Circuit  Court  Law — no 
better  and  no  worse  than  he  has  measured  off  to  several  editorial  culprits 
before  us.  They  are  the  settled  maxims  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  this 
State  in  regard  to  the  law  of  libel  as  applied  to  Editors  and  Newspapers, 
and  we  must  have  been  a  goose  to  expect  any  better  than  had  been  served 
out  to  our  betters.  The  Judge  was  hardly,  if  at  all,  at  liberty  to  know  or 
tolerate  any  other. 

********* 

"But  we  have  filled  our  paper,  and  must  close.  The  Judge  charged 
very  hard  against  us  on  the  facts  of  the  case,  as  calling  for  a  pretty  sizable 
verdict — our  legal  guilt  had  of  course  been  settled  long  before  in  the 
Supreme  Court. 

"  When  the  Charge  commenced,  we  would  not  have  given  Fenimore  the 
first  red  cent  for  his  verdict;  when  it  closed,  we  understood  that  we  were 
booked  to  suffer  some.  If  the  Jury  had  returned  a  verdict  in  our  favour, 
the  Judge  must  have  been  constrained  by  his  charge  to  set  it  aside,  as 
contrary  to  law. 

"  The  Jury  retired  about  half-past  two,  and  the  rest  of  us  went  to  dinner. 
The  Jury  were  hungry  too,  and  did  not  stay  out  long.  On  comparing 
notes,  there  were  seven  of  them  for  a  verdict  of  $100,  two  for  $200,  and  three 
for  $500.  They  added  these  sums  up — total  $2,600 — divided  by  12,  and  the 
dividend  was  a  little  over  $200;  so  they  called  it  $200  damages  and  six 
cents  costs,  which  of  course  carries  full  costs  against  us.  We  went  back 
from  dinner,  took  the  verdict  in  all  meekness,  took  a  sleigh,  and  struck  a 
bee-line  for  New- York. 

"Thus  for  The  Tribune  the  rub-a-dub  is  over;  the  adze  we  trust  laid 
aside;  the  staves  all  in  their  places;  the  hoops  tightly  driven;  and  the 
heading  not  particularly  out  of  order.  Nothing  remains  but  to  pay  piper, 
or  cooper,  or  whatever;  and  that  shall  be  promptly  attended  to. 

"Yes,  Fenimore  shall  have  his  $200.  To  be  sure,  we  don't  exactly  see 
how  we  came  to  owe  him  that  sum;  but  he  has  won  it,  and  shall  be  paid. 
'The  court  awards  it,  and  the  law  doth  give  it.'  We  should  like  to  meet 
him  and  have  a  social  chat  over  the  whole  business,  now  it  is  over.  There 
has  been  a  good  deal  of  fun  in  it,  come  to  look  back ;  and  if  he  has  as 
little  ill  will  toward  us  as  we  bear  to  him,  there  shall  never  be  another 
hard  thought  between  us.  We  don't  blame  him  a  bit  for  the  whole  matter; 
he  thought  we  injured  him,  sued  us,  and  got  his  pay.  Since  the  Jury  have 
cut  down  his  little  bill  from  $3,000  to  $200,  we  won't  higgle  a  bit  about  the 
talance,  but  pay  it  on  sight.  In  fact,  we  rather  like  the  idea  of  being  so 
munificent  a  patron  (for  our  means)  of  American  Literature;  and  are  glad 
to  do  anything  for  one  of  the  most  creditable  (of  old)  of  our  authors,  who 
are  now  generally  reduced  to  any  shift  for  a  living  by  that  grand  National 


THE  FENIMORE   COOPER   LIBEL-SUITS.  143 

rascality  and  greater  folly,  the  denial  of  International  Copyright.  ('  My 
pensive  public,'  don't  flatter  yourself  that  we  are  to  be  rendered  mealy- 
mouthed  toward  you  by  our  buffeting.  We  shall  put  it  to  your  iniquities 
just  as  straight  as  a  loon's  leg,  calling  a  spade  a  spade,  and  not  an  oblong 
garden  implement,  until  the  judicial  construction  of  the  law  of  libel  shall 
take  another  hitch,  and  its  penalties  be  invoked  to  shield  communities  as 
well  as  individuals  from  censure  for  their  transgressions.  Till  then,  keep 
a  bright  look  out !) 

"  And  Richard,  too,  shall  have  his  share  of  '  the  spoils  of  victory.'  He 
has  earned  them  fairly,  and,  in  the  main,  like  a  gentleman — making  us  no 
needless  trouble,  and  we  presume  no  needless  expense.  All  was  fair  and 
above  board,  save  some  little  specks  in  his  opening  of  the  case,  which  we 
noticed  some  hours  ago,  and  have  long  since  forgiven.  For  the  rest,  we 
rather  like  what  we  have  seen  of  him ;  and  if  anybody  has  any  law  busi- 
ness in  Otsego,  or  any  libel  suits  to  prosecute  anywhere,  we  heartily 
recommend  Richard  to  do  the  work,  warranting  the  client  to  be  hand- 
somely taken  in  and  done  for  throughout.  (There  's  a  puff,  now,  a  man 
may  be  proud  of.  We  don't  give  such  every  day  out  of  pure  kindness. 
It  was  Fenimore,  we  believe,  that  said  on  the  trial,  that  our  word  went  a 
great  way  in  this  country.)  Can  we  say  a  good  word  for  you,  gallant 
foeman?  We'll  praise  any  thing  of  yours  we  have  read  except  the 
Monikins. 

"  But  sadder  thoughts  rush  in  on  us  in  closing.  Our  case  is  well  enough, 
or  of  no  moment;  but  we  cannot  resist  the  conviction  that  by  the  result 
of  these  Cooper  libel-suits,  and  by  the  Judicial  constructions  which  pro- 
duce that  result,  the  Liberty  of  the  Press  —  its  proper  influence  and 
respectability,  its  power  to  rebuke  wrong  and  to  exert  a  salutary  influence 
upon  the  Public  Morals  is.  fearfully  impaired.  We  do  not  see  how  any 
paper  can  exist,  and  speak  and  act  worthily  and  usefully  in  this  State, 
without  subjecting  itself  daily  to  innumerable,  unjust,  and  crushing 
prosecutions  and  indictments  for  libel.  Even  if  Juries  could  have  nerves 
of  iron  to  say  and  do  what  they  really  think  right  between  man  and  man, 
the  costs  of  such  prosecution  would  ruin  any  journal.  But  the  Liberty 
of  the  Press  has  often  been  compelled  to  appeal  from  the  bench  to  the 
people.  It  will  do  so  now,  and  we  will  not  doubt  with  success.  Let  not, 
then,  the  wrong-doer  who  is  cunning  enough  to  keep  the  blind  side  of  the 
law,  the  swindling  banker  who  has  spirited  away  the  means  of  the  widow 
and  orphan,  the  libertine  who  has  dragged  a  fresh  victim  to  his  lair, 
imagine  that  they  are  permanently  shielded,  by  this  misapplication  of  the 
law  of  libel,  from  fearless  exposure  to  public  scrutiny  and  indignation  by 
the  eagle  gaze  of  an  unfettered  Press.  Clouds  and  darkness  may  for  the 
moment  rest  upon  it,  but  they  cannot  in  the  nature  of  things,  endure.  In 
the  very  gloom  of  its  present  humiliation  we  read  the  prediction  of  its 
speedy  and  certain  restoration  to  its  rights  and  its  true  dignity — to  a 
sphere  not  of  legal  sufferance  merely,  but  of  admitted  usefulness  and 
honour." 


144  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

After  the  trial,  Mr.  Greeley  proceeded  immediately  to  New- 
York  and  wrote  the  account  of  it  from  which  the  foregoing 
extracts  have  been  made.  He  also  wrote  other  matter  for  the 
same  number  of  The  Tribune.  The  report  alone  filled  eleven 
columns  of  the  paper,  making  more  reading  matter  than  is 
contained  in  any  fifty  pages  of  Bancroft's  History  of  the 
United  States.  "  I  think,"  said  Mr.  Greeley  in  1S68,  "  that 
was  the  best  single  day's  work  I  ever  did."  Mr.  Cooper,  who 
appears  to  have  had  a  mania  for  libel  suits,  brought  another 
action  against  Mr.  Greeley  for  several  alleged  libels  in  his 
report,  but  the  skill  of  his  lawyers — William  H.  Seward  aud 
A.  B.  Conger — and  his  own  humourous  articles  drove  the 
novelist  out  of  court.  The  cause  never  came  to  trial.  But 
Mr.  Cooper  never  came  to  have  any  great  respect  for  the 
public  press.  "  Ubi  dolor,  ibi  digitas,  one  must  needs  scratch 
where  it  itches,"  drolly  says  the  author  of  "  The  Anatomy  of 
Melancholy." 

Mr.  Greeley,  in  his  Recollections,  speaks  of  certain  libel 
suits  which  Mr.  Weed  had  brought  against  sundry  editors  for 
gross  assaults  upon  him,  which  were  finally  dropped  out  of 
court  as  too  ancient  and  fishlike  to  receive  attention;  and 
remarks: 

This  was  probably  the  best  disposition  for  him  that  could  have  been 
made  of  them.  If  he  had  tried  them,  and  recovered  nominal  verdicts,  hig 
enemies  would  have  shouted  over  those  verdicts  as  virtually  establishing 
the  truth  of  their  charges;  while,  if  he  had  been  awarded  exemplary 
damages,  these  would  have  been  cited  as  measuring  the  damages  to  be 
given  against  him  in  each  of  the  hundred  libel-suits  thereafter  brought 
against  him.  This  consideration  was  forcibly  brought  home  to  me  when, 
years  afterward,  having  been  outrageously  libelled  with  regard  to  a  sum 
of  $1,000,  which  it  was  broadly  intimated  that  a  railroad  or  canal  com- 
pany in  Iowa  had  given  me  for  services  rendered,  or  to  be  rendered,  I 
ordered  suits  commenced  against  two  of  the  most  reckless  libellers.  But, 
when  time  had  been  allowed  for  reflection,  I  perceived  that  I  could  afford 
neither  to  lose  nor  to  win  these  suits ;  that  such  verdicts  as  I  ought  to 
recover  would  be  cited  as  measuring  the  damages  that  I  ought  to  pay  in 
all  future  libel-suits  brought  against  me ;  so  I  gladly  accepted  such  retrac- 
tions as  my  libellers  saw  fit  to  make,  and  discontinued  my  suits.  Hence- 
forth,  that  man  muat  very  badly  want  to  be  sued  who  provokes  me  to  sue 
him  for  libel.  * 

»  Page  365. 


LIBELS.  14:5 

The  law  of  libel  in  New  York  was  amended,  to  some  extent 
in  the  interest  of  the  freedom  of  the  press,  in  consequence  of 
the  many  suits  instigated  by  Mr.  Cooper  and  by  black-mailing 
lawyers;  but  there,  as  elsewhere,  it  is  still  susceptible  of  great 
improvement,  in  the  interest  both  of  the  people  and  of  justice. 

Mr.  Greeley,  in  the  work  from  which  we  have  just  read  an 
extract,  concludes  his  account  of  his  connexion  with  libel-suits 
with  interesting  biographical  facts  and  a  wise  practical  sug- 
gestion. He  says: 

Twice,  in  the  course  of  my  thirty-odd  years  of  editorship,  1  have 
encountered  human  beings  base  enough  to  require  me  to  correct  a  dam- 
aging  statement,  and  after  I  had  done  so  to  the  extent  of  their  desire,  to 
sue  me  upon  that  retracted  statement  as  a  libel !  I  think  this  proves  more 
than  the  depravity  of  the  persons  implicated, — that  it  indicates  a  glaring 
defect  in  the  law  or  the  ruling  under  which  such  a  manoeuvre  is  possible. 
If  the  law  were  honest,  or  merely  decent,  it  would  refuse  to  be  made  an 
accomplice  of  such  villainy. 

Ere  many  years,  I  hope  to  see  all  the  reputable  journals  of  this  city,  if 
not  of  the  entire  State,  unite  in  an  association  for  mutual  defence  against 
vexatious  and  unreasonable  libel-suits.  .  They  ought  to  do  this ;  employing 
a  capable  and  painstaking  lawyer,  to  whom  every  suit  for  libel  against 
any  member  of  the  association  should  at  once  be  referred,  with  instruc- 
tions to  investigate  it  candidly,  and  decide  whether  its  defence  ought  or 
ought  not  to  devolve  on  the  press  generally.  If  not,  let  it  be  remitted  to 
the  counsel  for  the  journal  prosecuted ;  but,  if  the  prosecution  be  clearly 
unreasonable  and  vexatious,  —  a  lawyer's  dodge  to  levy  black-mail, — then 
let  no  money  or  effort  be  spared  to  baffle  and  defeat  the  nefarious  attempt. 
Such  a  combination  for  mutual  defence  would  .arrest  the  prevailing  habit 
of  paying  $50  or  $100  to  buy  off  the  plaintiff's  attorney  as  the  cheapest 
way  out  of  a  bother,  would  soon  greatly  reduce  the  number  or  suits  for 
libel,  and  would  result  in  a  substantial  and  permanent  enlargenvsut  of 
the  Freedom  of  the  Press.  I*  should  have  been  formed  long  agw  l 

•Page  267. 


CHAPTER   IX. 

SOCIALISM  AND  OTHER  "ISMS." 

Mr.  Qreeley's  Socialism  —  His  Mature  Views  as  Set  Forth  by  Himself — 
The  Famous  Discussion  With  Mr.  Raymond  — The  Effect  of  Mr. 
Greeley'g  Supposed  Opinions  Upon  New- York  Journalism  —  Estab- 
lishment of  The  Times  —  "  Grahamism  "  —  Spiritualism  —  Jenny  Lind 
Attends  "the  Rappings"  at  Mr.  Grecley's  House  —  Summing  up  of 
His  "  Isms." 

MOOT  young  men  of  generous  dispositions  who  are  led 
seriously  to  reflect  upon  the  past  progress  and  present  situa- 
tion of  mankind,  take  a  tilt  against  society  as  it  is  organized. 
It  is  perhaps  true  that  a  majority  of  such  men  are,  for  a  longer 
or  shorter  period  of  their  lives  according  to  circumstances, 
sincere,  earnest  enemies  of  the  existing  state  of  things.  Men 
who  have  become  poets  of  world-wide  renown,  others  who 
have  largely  contributed  to  thought,  philosophy,  science, 
gtatesmanship,  were  in  the  fresh  flush  of  their  manhood  social- 
ists "of  the  most  straightest  sect," — unquestioned  "destruc- 
tives," "agrarians,"  and  the  rest  of  those  horrid  things,  in 
youth;  staid  conservatives  and  even  adulatory  poets-laureate 
when  they  reached  that  part  of  their  lives  when  the 'sere  and 
yellow  leaves  of  age  sadly  rustled  along  their  prosperous 
pathway.  The  plan  by  which  to  extirpate  poverty,  vice,  crime, 
which  has  been  adopted  at  least  in  theory  by  more  men  than 
is  commonly  supposed,  from  the  establishment  of  the  first 
Christian  Church  down  to  the  present  time  is  socialism. 
With  thousands  of  pure  men  this  has  been  a  delightful  dream; 
a  magnificent  mirage,  with  beautiful  structures  built  of  the 
viewless  air  on  the  shifting  sands  of  desert  waste. 

It  was  natural  and  logical  that  Horace  Greeley,  a  mos4 
generous  nature,  one  hating  all  forms  and  manifestations  of 
injustice,  a  born  Reformer,  should  look  with  approbation  upon 
•  scheme,  which  claimed  to  be  able  to  drive  poverty  and  vice 

(HO) 


SOCIALISM.  147 

and  misery  from  the  land,  and  build  up  a  community  of  pros- 
perous, virtuous  citizens.  Moreover,  he  had  a  strong  natural 
repugnance — last  infirmity  of  noble  mind — to  receiving  any 
person's  or  any  number  of  persons'  ideas  upon  trust,  lie  had 
very  little  respect  for  authority,  as  such.  This  is  always  the 
case  with  men  whose  fixed,  unselfish  purpose  is  to  leave  the 
world  better  for  their  having  lived  in  it.  lie  was  a  lover  of 
fair  play,  and  ever  insisted  on  giving  men  a  chance  to  publish 
their  views,  if  there  were  a  possibility  of  any  good  coining 
from  them.  He  became  a  Socialist.  The  fact  was  of  grave 
import  in  his  life.  It  subjected  him  to  a  vast  deal  of  harsh 
criticism,  ridicule,  and  misrepresentation.  I  deem  it  but 
simple  justice,  therefore,  that  his  mature  views  upon  this  sub- 
ject, as  set  forth  by  himself  years  after  the  fierce  newspaper 
conflicts  to  which  they  gave  rise,  should  be  here  incorporated 
in,  extenso  in  his  own  words.  Tims  will  men  be  able  right- 
eously to  approve  or  condemn,  as  may  seem  to  them  reasonable 
and  just.  Besides,  those  who  condemn  in  advance,  thus  have 
the  opportunity  afforded  them  of  skipping  the  few  following 
pages,  of  complacently  nursing  their  wisdom  to  keep  it  warm, 
and  then  going  on  with  the  rest  of  us  in  our  biographical 
journey. 

Mr.  Greeley  thus  relates  at  length  how  he  became  a  Socialist, 
and  just  what  his  Socialism  was: 

"  The  Winter  of  1837-38,  though  happily  mild  and  open  till  far  into 
January,  was  one  of  pervading  destitution  and  suffering  in  our  city,  from 
paralysis  of  business  and  consequent  dearth  of  employment.  The  liberality 
of  those  who  could  and  would  give  was  heavily  taxed  to  save  from 
famishing  the  tens  of  thousands  who,  being  needy  and  unable  to  find 
employment,  first  ran  into  debt  so  far  as  they  could,  and  thenceforth  must 
be  helped  or  starve.  For,  in  addition  to  all  who  may  be  said  to  belong 
here,  legions  of  labourers,  servants,  etc.,  are  annually  dismissed  in  Au- 
tumn from  the  farms,  country-seats,  and  watering-places  of  the  suburban 
districts,  and  drift  down  to  the  city,  whence  they  were  mainly  hired ; 
vaguely  hoping  to  find  work  here,  which  a  small  part  of  them  do:  the 
rest  live  on  the  good-nature  of  relatives,  if  such  they  have  here,  or  on 
credit  from  boarding-houses,  landlords,  or  grocers,  so  long  as  they  can; 
and  then  make  their  choice  between  roguery  and  beggary,  or  change  from 
this  to  that,  or  take  them  mixed,  as  chance  may  dictate.  Since  the 
general  ditYusion  of  railroads  and  the  considerable  extension  of  our 
manufacturing  industry,  business  is  far  more  equable  than  it  was,  even  in 


148  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

prosperous  times,  thirty  years  ago ;  but  Winter  is  still  a  season  of  priva- 
tion and  suffering  to  many  thousands  who  live  in  tolerable  comfort 
through  the  warmer  seasons.  To  say  that  ten  thousand  young  persons  here 
annually  take  their  first  lessons  in  debauchery  and  crime  would  be  to  keep 
quite  within  the  truth;  and,  while  passion,  ignorance,  and  miseducation 
ruin  their  thousands,  I  judge  that  destitution  flowing  from  involuntary 
idleness  sends  more  men  and  women  to  perdition,  in  this  city,  than  any 
other  cause,  —  intemperance  possibly  excepted. 

"  I  lived  that  Winter  in  the  Sixth  Ward,  —  then,  as  now,  eminent  for 
filth,  squalour,  rags,  dissipation,  want,  and  misery.  A  public  meeting  of 
its  citizens  was  duly  held  early  in  December,  and  an  organization  formed 
thereat,  by  which  committees  were  appointed  to  canvass  the  Ward,  from 
house  to  house,  collect  funds  from  those  who  could  and  would  spare 
anything,  ascertain  the  nature  and  extent  of  the  existing  destitution,  and 
devise  ways  and  means  for  its  systematic  relief.  Very  poor  myself,  I 
oould  give  no  money,  or  but  a  mite ;  so  I  gave  trme  instead,  and  served, 
through  several  days,  on  one  of  the  visiting  committees.  I  thus  saw 
extreme  destitution  more  closely  than  I  had  ever  before  observed  it,  and 
was  enabled  to  scan  its  repulsive  features  intelligently.  I  saw  two 
families,  including  six  or  eight  children,  burrowing  in  one  cellar  under  a 
stable,  —  a  prey  to  famine  on  the  one  hand,  and  to  vermin  and  cutaneous 
maladies  on  the  other,  with  sickness  adding  its  horrors  to  those  of  a 
polluted  atmosphere  and  a  wintry  temperature.  I  saw  men  who  each, 
somehow,  supported  his  family  on  an  income  of  $5  per  week  or  less,  yet 
who  cheerfully  gave  something  to  mitigate  the  sufferings  of  those  who 
were  really  poor.  I  saw  three  widows,  with  as  many  children,  living  in 
an  attic  on  the  profits  of  an  apple-stand  which  yielded  less  than  $3  per 
week,  and  the  landlord  came  in  for  a  full  third  of  that.  But  worst  to 
bear  of  all  was  the  pitiful  plea  of  stout,  resolute,  single  young  men  and 
young  women :  '  We  do  not  want  alms ;  we  are  not  beggars ;  we  hate  to 
sit  here  day  by  day  idle  and  useless ;  help  us  to  work,  —  we  want  no  other 
help ;  why  is  it  that  we  can  have  nothing  to  do  ?' 

"  I  pondered  these  scenes  at  intervals  throughout  the  next  two  or  three 
years,  and  was  impelled  thereby  to  write  for  The  New-Yorker  —  I  think, 
in  the  Winter  of  1839-40  —  a  series  of  articles  entitled,  'What  shall  be 
done  for  the  Labourer?'  I  believe  these  attracted  the  attention  of  Mr. 
Albert  Brisbane,  a  young  man  of  liberal  education  and  varied  culture,  a 
native  of  Batavia,  N.  Y,,  which  he  still  regarded  as  his  home,  but  who 
had  travelled  widely  and  observed  thoughtfully;  making  the  acquaintance 
in  Paris  of  the  school  of  Socialists  called  (after  their  founder)  St.  Simon- 
ians,  and  that  also  of  Charles  Fourier,  the  founder  of  a  different  school, 
which  had  been  distinguished  by  his  name.  Robert  Owen,  by  his 
experiments  at  New  Lanark  and  his  '  New  Views  of  Society,'  was  the  first 
in  this  century  to  win  public  attention  to  Socialism,  though  (I  believe) 
Fourier  had  not  only  speculated,  but  written,  before  either  of  his  co- 
labourers.  But  Owen  was  an  extensive  and  successful  manufacturer ;  St. 
Simon  was  a  soldier,  and  the  heir  of  a  noble  family ;  while  Fourier  was  a 


SOCIALISM. 

poor  clerk,  reserved  and  taciturn,  whose  hard,  dogmatic,  algebraic  style 
seemed  expressly  calculated  to  discourage  readers  and  repel  adherents ;  so 
that  his  disciples  were  few  indeed,  down  to  the  date  of  his  death  in  1837. 
Mr.  Brisbane,  returning  not  long  afterward  from  Europe,  prepared  and 
published  his  first  work  —  which  was  an  exposition  and  commendation 
of  Fourier's  industrial  system  —  in  1840.  My  acquaintance  with  the 
author  and  his  work  commenced  soon  afterward. 

"I  sum  up  these  three  competing  projects  of  Social  Reform  as  fol- 
lows :  — 

"•Owen.  —  Place  human  beings  in  proper  relations,  under  favouring 
circumstances  (among  which  I  include  Education  and  Intelligence),  and 
they  will  do  right  rather  than  wrong.  Hitherto,  the  heritage  of  the  great 
majority  has  been  filth,  squalour,  famine,  ignorance,  superstition;  and 
these  have  impelled  many  to  indolence  and  vice,  if  not  to  crime.  Make 
their  external  conditions  what  tbey  should  be,  and  these  will  give  place  to 
industry,  sobriety,  and  virtue. 

"St.  Simon.  —  'Love  is  the  fulfilling  of  the  law.'  Secure  to  everyone 
opportunity;  let  each  do  whatever  he  can  do  best;  and  the  highest  good 
of  the  whole  will  be  achieved  and  perpetuated. 

"  Fourier.  —  Society,  as  we  find  "it,  is  organized  rapacity.  Half  of  its 
force  is  spent  in  repressing  or  resisting  the  jealousies  and  rogueries  of  its 
members.  We  need  to  organize  Universal  Justice  based  on  Science.  The 
true  Eden  lies  before,  not  behind  us.  We  may  so  provide  that  Labour, 
now  repulsive,  shall  be  attractive ;  while  its  efficiency  in  production  shall  be 
increased  by  the  improvement  of  machinery  and  the  extended  use  of 
natural  forces,  so  as  to  secure  abundance,  education,  and  elegant  luxury, 
to  all.  What  is  needed  is  to  provide  all  with  homes,  employment,  instruc- 
tion, good  living,  the  most  effective  implements,  machinery,  etc.,  securing 
to  each  the  fair  and  full  recompense  of  his  achievement;  and  this  can  best 
be  attained  through  the  association  of  some  four  to  five  hundred  families 
in  a  common  household,  and  in  the  ownership  and  cultivation  of  a  com- 
mon domain,  say  of  2,000  acres,  or  about  one  acre  to  each  person  living 
thereon. 

"I  accept,  unreservedly,  the  views  of  no  man,  dead  or  living.  "The 
master  has  said  it,'  was  never  conclusive  with  me.  Even  though  I  have 
found  him  right  nine  times,  I  do  not  take  his  tenth  proposition  on  trust; 
unless  that  also  be  proved  sound  and  rational,  I  reject  it.  But  I  am  con- 
vinced, after  much  study  and  reflection,  that  the  Social  Reformers  are 
right  on  many  points,  even  when  clearly  wrong  on  others ;  and  I  deem 
Fourier — though  in  many  respects  erratic,  mistaken,  visionary — the  most 
suggestive  and  practical  among  them.  I  accept  nothing  on  his  authority; 
for  I  find  many  of  his  speculations  fantastic,  erroneous,  and  (in  my  view) 
pernicious;  but  on  many  points  he  commands  my  unreserved  concur- 
rence. Yet  I  prefer  to  set  forth  my  own  Social  creed  rather  than  his,  even 
wherein  mine  was  borrowed  from  his  teachings ;  and  mine  is,  briefly,  as 
follows : — 

M  I.    I  believe  that  there  need  be,  and  should  be,  no  paupers  who  are  not 


150  LITE   OF   HORACE   GKEELEY. 

infantile,  idiotic,  or  disabled ;  and  that  civilized  society  pays  more  for  the 
support  of  able-bodied  pauperism  than  the  necessary  cost  of  its  extirpa- 
tion. 

"  II.  I  believe  that  they  babble  idly  and  libel  Providence  who  talk  of 
surplus  Labour,  or  the  inadequacy  of  Capital  to  supply  employment  to  all 
•who  need  it.  Labour  is  often  most  required  and  best  paid  where  Capital 
is  scarcest  (as  was  shown  in  California  in  1849-50);  and  there  is  always — 
even  in  China — far  more  work  than  hands,  provided  the  ability  to  devise 
and  direct  be  not  wanting.  Where  Labour  stands  idle,  save  in  the  presence 
of  some  great  public  calamity,  there  is  a  demonstrated  deficiency,  not  of 
Capital,  but  of  brains. 

"  III.  I  believe  that  the  efficiency  of  human  effort  is  enormously,  ruin, 
ously  diminished  by  what  I  term  Social  Anarchy.  That  is  to  say :  '  We  spend 
half  our  energies  in  building  fences  and  providing  safeguards  against  each 
other's  roguery,'  while  our  labour  is  rendered  inefficient  and  inadequately 
productive  by  bad  management,  imperfect  implements,  a  deficiency  of 
power  (animal  or  steam),  and  the  inability  of  our  producers  to  command 
and  wield  the  most  effective  machinery.  It  is  quite  within  the  truth  to 
estimate  the  annual  product  of  our  National  Industry  at  less  than  one 
half  what  it  might  be  if  better  applied  and  directed. 

"  IV.  Inefficiency  in  production  is  paralleled  by  waste  in  consumption. 
Insects  and  vermin  devour  at  least  one-fourth  of  the  farmer's  harvests, 
which  inadequate  fertilizing  and  unskilful  cultivation  have  already 
reduced  far  below  the  proper  aggregate.  A  thousand  cooks  are  required, 
and  a  thousand  fires  maintained,  to  prepare  badly  the  food  of  a  township ; 
when  a  dozen  fires  and  a  hundred  cooks  might  do  it  far  better,  and  with  a 
vast  saving  in  quantity  as  well  as  improvement  in  quality.  [I  judge  that 
the  cooks  of  Paris  would  subsist  One  Million  persons  on  the  food  consumed 
or  wasted  by  Six  Hundred  Thousand  in  this  city ;  feeding  them  better  than 
they  are  now  fed,  and  prolonging  their  lives  by  an  average  of  five  years.] 

"V.  Youth  should  be  a  season  of  instruction  in  Industry  and  the  Useful 
Arts,  as  well  as  in  Letters  and  the  Sciences  mastered  by  their  aid.  Each 
child  should  be  trained  to  skill  and  efficiency  in  productive  Labour.  The 
hours  of  children  should  be  alternately  devoted  to  Labour,  Study,  and 
Recreation, — say  two  hours  to  each  before,  and  a  like  allotment  after, 
dinner  each  secular  clay.  Thus  each  child  would  grow  up  an  adept,  not 
merely  in  letters,  but  in  arts, — a  skilful  worker  as  well  as  a  proficient  in 
the  lessons  of  the  school-room, — able  to  do  well,  not  one  thing  only,  but 
many  things, — familiar  with  mechanical  as  well  as  agricultural  processes, 
and  acquainted  with  the  use  of  steam  and  the  direction  of  machinery. 
Not  till  one  has  achieved  the  fullest  command,  the  most  varied  use,  of  all 
his  faculties  and  powers,  can  he  be  properly  said  to  be  educated. 

"  VI.  Isolation  is  at  war  with  efficiency  and  with  progress.  As  '  iron 
sharpeneth  iron,'  so  are  man's  intellectual  and  inventive  faculties  stimu- 
lated by  contact  with  his  fellow-men.  A  nation  of  herdsmen,  dwelling  in 
movable  tents,  invents  little  or  nothing,  and  makes  no  progress,  or  next  to 
uoiie.  Serfdom  was  the  general  condition  of  the  labouring  class  in  Europe, 


SOCIALISM.  151 

until  aggregation  in  cities  and  manufactories,  diffusing  intelligence,  and 
nourishing  aspiration,  wrought  its  downfall. 

"  VII.  The  poor  work  at  perpetual  disadvantage  in  isolation,  because 
of  the  inadequacy  of  their  means.  Let  us  suppose  that  four  or  five  hun- 
dred heads  of  families  propose  to  embark  in  Agriculture.  Each  buys  his 
little  farm,  his  furniture,  his  implements,  animals,  seeds,  fertilizers,  &c., 
&c.,  and — though  he  has  purchased  nothing  that  he  does  not  urgently 
need—  he  finds  his  means  utterly  exhausted,  and  his  farm  and  future  exer- 
tions heavily  burdened  by  debt.  He  hopes  and  labours  to  clear  off  the 
mortgage;  but  flood  and  drouth,  frost  and  fire,  work  against  him;  his 
poverty  compels  him  to  do  without  many  implements,  and  to  plough  or 
team  with  inadequate  force ;  he  runs  up  an  account  at  the  store,  and  pays 
twenty  per  cent,  extra  for  his  goods,  because  others,  who  buy  on  credit, 
fail  to  pay  at  all ;  and  so  he  struggles  on,  till  his  strength  fails,  and  he  dies 
oppressed  with  debt.  Such  is  the  common  lot. 

"VIII.  Association  would  have  these  unite  to  purchase,  inhabit,  and 
cultivate  a  common  domain, — say,  of  two  thousand  acres, — whereby  these 
advantages  over  the  isolated  system  would  be  realized: — 

"  1.  One-fourth  (at  most)  of  the  land  required  under  the  old  system 
would  be  found  abundant. 

"2.  It  could  be  far  better  allotted  and  appropriated  to  Grain,  Grass, 
Fruits,  Forest,  Garden,  &c. 

"3.  The  draught  animals  that  were  far  too  few,  when  dispersed  among 
five  hundred  owners,  on  so  many  different  farms,  would  be  amply  sufficient 
for  a  common  domain. 

"  4.  Steam  or  water  power  could  now  be  economically  employed  for  a 
hundred  purposes — cutting  and  sawing  timber,  threshing  and  grinding 
grain,  ploughing  the  soil,  and  for  many  household  uses  —  where  the  small 
farmer  could  not  think  of  employing  it. 

"  5.  Industry  would  find  new  and  powerful  incentives  in  the  observa- 
tion and  praise  or  censure  of  the  entire  community ;  uniforms,  banners, 
and  music,  with  the  rivalry  of  bands  of  competing  workers,  would 
provoke  emulation  and  lighten  labour ;  while  such  recreations  as  dramas, 
concerts,  readings,  &c. , —  now  utterly  beyond  the  reach  of  rural  workers, — 
would  give  a  new  zest  to  life.  At  present  our  youth  escape  from  rural 
industry  when  they  can, — not  that  they  really  hate  work,  but  that  they 
find  their  leisure  hours  even  duller  and  less  endurable  than  those  they  give 
to  rugged  toil."  * 

It  thus  appears  that  Mr.  Greeley's  "  Socialism  "  was  neither 
Fourierism,  St.  Simonism,  Owenism,  nor  any  other  "  ism," 
without  qualification.-  If  any  ism  at  all,  it  was  Greeleyism  as 
applied  to  social  reform.  It  was  Association;  Cooperation; 
cooperation,  not  clearly  outlined,  indeed,  but  still  the  idea; 

Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life,  p.  143,  et  seq. 


152  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GKEELEY. 

then  in  helpless  infancy,  now  believed  by  many  of  the  noblest 
thinkers  and  workingmen  of  the  times  to  embody  the  plan  by 
which  Labour  shall  be  emancipated  from  oppressive  IRMTB, 
usages,  and  opinions,  and  thus  confer  incalculable  benefit  upon 
mankind.  Having  passed  through  Horace  Greeley's  mental 
crucible,  that  which  was  called  Socialism  became  the  germ  of  a 
great  and  beneficent  reform. 

But  not  suddenly.  And  some  may  say  the  proposed  reform 
was  as  first  conceived  by  him  too  sweeping  in  its  nature.  They 
would  assert  that  so  late  as  1851,  they  find  him,  after  visiting 
a  "^Ragged  School "  of  London,  and  witnessing  the  unspeak- 
able wretchedness  and  degradation  of  the  scholars,  exclaiming: 
"The  chief  impression  made  on  me  by  the  spectacle  here 
presented  was  one  of  intense  sadness  and  self-reproach.  I 
deeply  realized  that  I  had  hitherto  said  too  little,  done  too 
little,  dared  too  little,  sacrificed  too  little,  to  awaken  attention 
to  the  infernal  wrongs  and  abuses  which  are  inherent  in  the 
very  structure  and  constitution,  the  nature  and  essence  of 
civilized  Society  as  it  now  exists  throughout  Christendom. 
Of  what  avail  are  alms-giving,  and  individual  benevolence,  and 
even  the  offices  of  religion,  in  the  presence  of  evil  so  gigantic 
and  so  inwoven  with  the  very  framework  of  Society?" 
Afterwards,  when  he  was  in  Ireland,  he  relates  this  incident: 
"  Walking  with  a  friend  through  one  of  the  back  streets  of 
Gal  way,  beside  the  outlet  of  the  lakes,  I  came  where  a  girl  of 
ten  years  old  was  breaking  up  hard  brook  pebbles  into  suitable 
fragments  to  mend  roads  with.  "We  halted,  and  M.  asked  her 
how  much  she  received  for  that  labour.  She  answered,  '  six- 
pence a  car-load.'  '  How  long  will  it  take  you  to  break  a  car- 
load?' *  About  a  fortnight.'"  A  poor  child  earning  for  her 
parents  a  half-penny  a  day,  and  that  by  hard  work,  failed  to 
impress  Horace  Greeley  with  a  favourable  opinion  of  existing 
institutions.  There  being  very  many  such  poor  children  at 
work  in  the  world,  he  audaciously  thought  it  was  right  to 
level  things.  His  socialism  was  guilty  of  this  charge:  it  made 
him  "a  leveller."  It  made  him  entitled  to  this  eulogium:  he 
proposed  to  level  up,  not  down.  He  did  not  propose  to  take 
riches  from  the  rich:  there  never  was  a  moment  when  he  advo 


SOCIALISM.  153 

catccl  any  rapacity  of  any  sort:  he  did  propose  to  give  comforts 
to  the  poor,  and  this  by  means  of  Association  supplying  the 
plaee,  to  a  large  extent,  of  capital.  He  certainly  did  some- 
times inveigh  against  organized  Society  with  fierce  invective, 
but  with  no  more  intention  of  tearing  society  up  by  the  roots 
than  he  had  of  eradicating  slavery  from  America  by  force  of 
arms  when  he  sustained  the  "Wilinot  Proviso  in  1848. 

Out  of  Mr.  Greeley's  Socialism,  such  as  it  was,  "  Fourier- 
ism  "  as  it  was  called,  grew  a  discussion  with  Mr.  Raymond, 
which  was  famous  at  the  time,  and  productive,  in  the  end,  of 
results  of  great  importance  to  both  of  the  eminent  disputants. 
Mr.  Brisbane,  mentioned  above  in  Mr.  Greeley's  account  of  his 
Socialism,  returned  from  a  visit  to  Europe  in  the  summer  of 
1846,  and  at  once  renowned  the  agitation  of  the  general  subject 
in  a  letter  to  the  editors  of  The  Courier  and  Enquirer,  but 
which  was  published  in  The  Tribune.  To  this  The  Courier 
and  Enquirer  replied,  and.  was  followed  by  an  editorial 
rejoinder  in  The  Tribune.  After  a  few  more  preliminary 
skirmishes,  Mr.  Greeley  challenged  The  Courier  and  Enquirer 
to  a  discussion,  saying: 

"  As  soon  as  the  State  election  is  fairly  over  —  say  November  10th  — we 
will  publish  an  entire  article,  filling  a  column  of  The  Tribune,  very 
nearly,  in  favour  of  Association  as  we  understand  it ;  and,  upon  The  Courier 
copying  this  and  replying,  we  will  give  place  to  its  reply,  and  respond ; 
and  so  on,  till  each  party  shall  have  published  twelve  articles  on  its  own 
side,  and  twelve  on  the  other,  which  shall  fulfill  the  terms  of  this  agree- 
ment. All  the  twelve  articles  of  each  party  shall  be  published  without 
abridgement  or  variation  in  the  Daily,  Weekly,  and  Semi-weekly  editions 
of  both  papers.  Afterward  each  party  will,  of  course,  be  at  liberty  to 
comment  at  pleasure  in  his  own  columns.  In  order  that  neither  paper 
shall  be  crowded  with  this  discussion,  one  article  per  week,  only,  on  either 
side,  shall  be  published,  unless  The  Courier  shall  prefer  greater  despatch. 
Is  not  this  a  fair  proposition  ?  What  says  The  Courier?  It  has,  of  course, 
the  advantage  of  the  defensive  position  and  of  the  last  word." 

The  contest  was  really  between  Mr.  Greeley  and  Mr.  Ray- 
mond. It  began  on  November  20th,  1846,  and  closed  on  the 
20th  of  May  following.  The  debate  was  conducted  with  great 
vigour  and  liveliness  on  either  side.  Mr.  Greeley's  first  article 
has  been  thus  happily  condensed  by  Mr.  Parton: 


154:  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

"The  earth,  the  air,  the  waters,  the  sunshine,  with  their  natural  products, 
were  divinely  intended  and  appointed  for  the  sustenance  and  enjoyment 
of  the  whole  human  family.  But  the  present  fact  is,  that  a  very  large 
majority  of  mankind  are  landless;  and,  by  law,  the  landless  have  no 
inherent  right  to  stand  on  a  single  square  foot  of  their  native  State, 
except  in  the  highways.  Perishing  with  cold,  they  have  no  legal  right  to 
a  stick  of  decaying  fuel  in  the  most  unfrequented  morass.  Famishing, 
they  have  no  legal  right  to  pluck  and  eat  the  bitterest  acorn  in  the  depths 
of  the  remotest  forest.  But  the  Past  cannot  be  recalled.  What  has  been 
done,  has  been  done.  The  legal  rights  of  individuals  must  be  held  sacred. 
But  those  whom  society  has  divested  of  their  natural  right  to  a  share  in 
the  soil,  are  entitled  to  Compensation,  i.  e.,  to  continuous  opportunity  to 
earn  a  subsistence  by  Labour.  To  own  land  is  to  possess  this  opportunity. 
The  majority  own  no  land.  Therefore  the  minority,  who  own  legally  all 
the  land,  which  naturally  belongs  to  all  men  alike,  are  bound  to  secure  to 
the  landless  majority  a  compensating  security  of  remunerating  Labour. 
But,  as  society  is  now  organized,  this  is  not,  and  cannot  be,  done.  '  Work, 
work!  give  us  something  to  do!  anything  that  will  secure  us  honest 
bread,'  is  at  this  moment  the  prayer  of  not  less  than  thirty  thousand 
human  beings  within  the  sound  of  the  City-Hall  bell.  Here  is  an  enor- 
mous waste  and  loss.  We  must  devise  a  remedy,  and  that  remedy,  I  pro- 
pose to  show,  is  found  in  Association." 

To  this  Mr.  Baymond  replied  in  splendid  ad  captandum 
style,  undertaking  to  show  that,  according  to  Mr.  Greeley  no 
man  can  rightfully  own  land.  Fanny  Wright,  as  he  called 
her,  did  not  more  unquestionably  assail  the  right  of  private 
property.  With  admirable  skill,  he  thus  placed  Mr.  Greeley 
on  the  defensive,  and  himself  occupied  the  vantage-ground  of 
general  approval  among  the  reading  public.  Mr.  Greeley 
next  came  on  with  some  energetic  language  in  reply  to  -the 
misrepresentation  of  his  position,  and  saying,  that  by  Associa- 
tion he  meant  a  Social  Order,  to  take  the  place  of  the  present 
Township,  to  be  composed  of  some  hundreds  or  thousands  of 
persons,  united  together  in  interest  and  industry  for  the  pur- 
pose of  securing  to  each  individual,  1,  a  commodious  house; 
2,  complete  and  thorough  education ;  3,  a  secure  subsistence; 
4,  opportunity  to  labour;  5,  fair  wages;  6,  agreeable  social 
relations;  and,  7,  progress  in  knowledge  and  skill. 

Mr.  Raymond  replied  with  great  skill  again,  but  was  forced 
to  admit  that  the  ends  desired  to  be  brought  about  by  Mr. 
Greeley  were  highly  desirable.  He  denied  that  Association 


DISCUSSION7   WITH   MR.    RAY.  .OLD.  i£«» 

•>-  mil  bring  aoout  the  desired  end,  and  demanded  of  la 
GrWi~/  to  substantiate  its  claim.  ."  Give  us  proof,"  lie  urgev.  _ 
"  o*  its  efficacy."  He  also  insisted  upon  knowing  in  whom 
tire  property  of  the  Social  Order  is  to  be  vested;  how  laboui 
is  to  be  remunerated;  what  share  capita1,  is  to  have  in  the 
concern;  by  what  device  men  are  to  be  induced  to  work;  and 
how  moral  offenses  are  to  be  dealt  with.  To  this  Mr.  Greeley 
responded  categorically,  that  the  property  of  an  Association 
will  be  vested  in  those  who  contributed  the  capital  to  establisD 
it,  represented  by  shares  of  stock.  Labour  will  be  remuneratea 
by  a  fixed  proportion  of  its  products,  or  of  its  proceeds,  if 
sold.  Men  will  be  induced  to  labour  by  a  knowledge  that  .Ha 
rewards  will  be  a  certain  and  major  proportion  of  the  product, 
which  of  course  will  be  less  or  more  according  to  the  skill  anC. 
industry  of  each  individual.  Moral  offenses  will  be  punishw'. 
by  legal  enactment,  and  they  will  be  rendered  unfrequent  nw 
plenty  and  education. 

Reaching  this  point  in  the  discussion,  we  have  embrace.'3, 
the  outlines  of  Association  as  Mr.  Greeley  understood  it. 
Henceforth  he  advocated  the  plan  with  great  fertility  of  argu- 
ment and  force  of  language,  Mr.  Raymond  combatting  with 
rare  adroitness  and  popular  effect.  The  judgment  of  the 
reading  public  was  emphatically  in  Mr.  Raymond's  favour; 
and  to  such  an  extent  that  he  persuaded  a  great  many  persons 
that  The  Tribune  was  a  decidedly  mischievous  journal.  With 
great  adroitness  he  confounded  Fourierism,  including  free 
love,  with  Mr.  Greeley's  ideas  of  Association,  and  charged  it 
upon  him  that  he  would  not  only  destroy  all  property,  and 
individual  effort,  but  Home,  personal  virtue,  and  make  a 
horrid  wreck  and  chaos  of  all  vested  rights  and  all  things 
held  sacred.  Mr.  Raymond  did  not,  indeed,  pretend  that  such 
was  any  part  of  Mr.  Greeley's  object;  nor  was  he  able  to  shoT? 
that  it  was  a  logical  result  of  his  plan.  But  artfully  showing 
from  the  writings  of  leading  Socialists  that  their  doctrines 
were  immoral  as  well  as  destructive  of  property,  and  assertive,- 
in  effect  that  Mr.  Greeley  did  not  improve  upon  their  plni.,  V» 
brought  down  upon  his  antagonist  no  little  odium  which  clnn^ 
to  him,  in  the  opinion  of  many,  especially  the  igno.-iT.it,  t..:i 


T3  LI*E   OF   HORACE  OEEELET. 


)i>  last  days.  3y  the  general  verdict,  Mr.  Haymona  ca:_e  o  't 
>f  the  contest  with  the  laurel  of  victory;  and  to  thi^  \L~. 
Greeley  himself  gracefully  yielded  acquiescence  by  henctlorth 
giving  Socialism  the  least  possible  attention  in  The  Tribune 
and  by  saying  nothing  whatever  of  Fourier. 

While  candour  thus  cheerfully  awards  to  Mr.  Raymond 
triumph  in  a  discussion  which  called  forth  on  either  side  the 
strength  and  stretch  of  the  human  understanding  in  many  of 
Ira  versatile  capacities,  more,  perhaps,  than  were  ever  exibited, 
before  or  since,  in  a  newspaper  controversy;  yet  it  is  also  but 
lust  to  affirm  that  in  the  results  of  the  discussion  both  dis- 
•^u^iits  accomplished  great  good:  Mr.  Raymond  immediately; 
j'lr.  Greeley  then,  and  for  the  indefinite  future.  In  then 
-showing  the  gross  evils  of  Fourierism,  Mr.  Raymond  conferred 
\n  inestimable  benefit  upon  his  countrymen.  In  then  calling 
•jn.blic  attention  to  Association,  Mr.  Greeley  did  an  incalculable 
service  to  Labour,  to  the  world's  poor  people,  the  good 
influences  of  which  shall  not  cease  until  all  mankind  shall 
have  been  levelled  up  out  of  the  sloughs  of  poverty,  and  vice, 
and  misery,  to  the  enjoyment  of  plenty,  of  the  sweets  of 
virtue,  and  all  the  blessings  of  genuine  Christian  civilization. 

Mr.  Greeley  took  an  active  part  in  one  or  two  efforts  to  give 
Socialism  practical  success,  notably  the  "North  American 
Phalanx,"  but  all  in  which  he  took  especial  interest  failed  to 
become  permanent  institutions.  He  concluded  that  practical 
Socialism  would  always  be  difficult,  though,  perhaps,  not 
impossible,  without  a  basis  of  religious  sympathy  and  reli- 
gious aspiration. 

One  effect  of  the  discussion  with  Mr.  Raymond  was,  undoubt- 
edly, to  injure  The  Tribune  in  the  judgment  of  a  large  number 
of  intelligent  and  influential  persons.  Mr.  Greeley  "  lost  caste." 
He  became  the  subject  of  many  a  vulgar  jest  on  the  streets, 
of  much  newspaper  ridicule;  all  which  neither  disturbed  nor 
injured  him.  But  respectable  persons  in  large  numbers  made 
rip  their  minds  that  Mr.  Greeley  was  a  dangerous  man  and  The 
Tribune  a  mischievous  paper.  And  the  continued  prevelance 
of  tMs  opinion,  —  it  being  constantly  fostered  by  the  press  of 
1  it  citji  gpoerally,  and  by  many  journals  in  the  country,  —  was 


fcPIRITUALISy.  157 

one  ci.us ,  cf  the  establishment  of  The  Times  \y  J..1?.  Raymond, 
ani  cf  its  popular  and  financial  success  only  a  fsw  years  after 
the  noted  discussion.  Mr.  Raymond  took  advantage  of  The 
Tribune's  undeserved  unpopularity  very  much  like  Mr.  Greeley 
had  taken  advantage  of  the  then  well-earned  disrepntability 
of  T.'.e  Herald.  "Whether  Mr.  Raymond  intended  this  by  the 
discuscion  and  the  manner  in  which  he  conducted  it,  —  to 
achieve  victory  rather  than  to  promote  the  cause  of  truth, — 
may  never  be  known.  But  Mr.  Raymond  was  a  born  politi- 
cian, an  certainly  as  Horace  Greeley  was  a  born  philanthropist. 

Much  was  also  made  of  Mr.  Greeley's  alleged  "  Grahamism." 
He  would  not  even  eat  like  other  people,  it  was  charged,  as 
though  one  did  not  have  any  sort  of  right  to  select  his  own 
food,  with  due  regard  to  cleanliness,  comfort,  economy,  and 
health.  It  was  said  that  he  lived  on  a  "  diet  of  saw-dust,"  and 
ae  opinion  got  abroad  that  lie  was  in  all  respects  an  outland- 
i"h  kind  of  a  man,  given  over  to  whim-whams  and  "isms," 
and  utterly  regardless  of  the  established  ways  of  Christian, 
J/iHed  beings!  As  a  matter  of  fact  he  never  was  aGraham- 
te,  'lough  he  was  decidedly  of  opinion  that  man  ought  rather 
tat  ''o  liv"!  than  live  to  eat.  Mrs.  Greeley  being  mistress  of  the 
household,  and  a  decided  Graham ite,  his  table  was  for  many 
years  almost  painfully  plain  to  visitors  accustomed  to  higher 
living;  but  this  only  showed  respect  for  his  wife  on  the  part 
of  Mr.  Greeley  and  no  disrespect  for  roast  beef,  nor  even 
chops  and  tomato  sauce. 

Mr.  Greeley  did  not  believe  in  "spiritualism,"  as  it  is  called, 
but  The  Tribune  gave  sp.ice  to  accounts  of  the  first  "knoc1:- 
ings,"  and  awarded  the  subject  a  respectful  hearirig.  And 
here  was  another  terrible  "  ism  "  charged  up  against  him!  As 
the  spiritual  phenomena  first  occurred  not  long  after  the  dis- 
cussion on  Socialism,  and  a  sect  of  spiritualists  quite  rapidly 
grew  up,  which,  whatever  of  good  or  evil  there  was  in  it,  was 
decidedly  unpopular  upon  the  whole,  and  believed  by  many  to 
be  a  new  manifestation  of  infidelity,  the  simple  fair  play  of  The 
Tribune  in  giving  the  subject  a  hearing  and  candid  treatment 
was  used  to  Mr.  Greeley's  disadvantage,  and  to  help  make  way 
for  The  Times.  When  the  Fox  family  came  to  New-York,  ii» 


158  LIFE  OF  LORACE  GREELEV. 

1850,  Mr.  Gr^cley  caJhd  upon  them  at  their  hotel,  to  personally 
witness  tiicl  ,a"  le-rapping  ^erforrr.anceb.  Y.J  was  not  much 
interested,  and  had  no  desire  for  a  second  "  sitting  "  but  Mrs 
Greeley,  then  much  interested  in  all  that  pertains  tr  the 
unseen  world  on  account  of  tha  recent  death  of  a  son  OA' 
uncommon  promise,  visited  the  Foxes,  and  invited  them  to 
spend  a  week  with  her  at  her  home.  Whilst  they  were  there, 
Jenny  land  had  a  "  sitting,"  which  is  thus  described  by  Mr. 
Greeley: 

"Not  long  after  this,  I  had  called  on  Mademoiselle  jenny  Lind,  taen  ., 
new  comer  among  us,  and  was  conversing  about  the  current  marvel  with 
the  late  N.  P.  Willis,  while  Mademoiselle  Lind  was  devoting  herself  more 
especially  to  some  other  callers.  Our  conversation  caught  Mademoiselle 
Lind's  ear,  and  arrested  her  attention ;  so,  after  making  some  inquiries, 
she  asked  if  she  could  witness  the  so-called  '  Manifestations.' 

"  I  answered  that  she  could  do  so  by  coming  to  my  house  in  the  hear* 
of  the  city,  as  Katy  Fox  was  then  staying  with  us.  She  assented,  and  ~ 
time  was  fixed  for  her  call ;  at  which  time  she  appeared,  with  a  conside  - 
able  retinue  of  total  strangers.  All  were  soon  seated  around  a  table,  and 
the  ' rappings'  were  soon  audible  and  abundant.  'Take  your  hands  fro_n 
under  the  table!'  Mademoiselle  Jenny  called  across  to  me  in  the  tone  and 
manner  of  an  indifferently  bold  archduchess.  4Whs,t?'  I  ..ske*',  n  . 
distinctly  comprehending  her.  'Take  your  hands  from  unde/  the  t' b.e !' 
she  imperiously  repeated ;  and  I  now  understood  that  she  suspected  m^ 
of  causing,  by  some  legerdemain,  the  puzzling  concussions.  I  instantly 
clasped  my  hands  over  my  head,  and  there  kept  them  until  the  sitting 
closed,  as  it  did  very  soon.  I  need  hardly  add  that  this  made  not  the 
smallest  difference  with  the  'rappings;'  but  I  was  thoroughly  and  finally 
cured  of  any  desire  to  exhibit  or  commend  them  to  strangers." 

Not  long  afterward  Mr.  Greeley  witnessed  what  he  strongly 
suspected  to  be  a  juggle  or  trick  on  the  part  of  a  "  medium," 
which  gave  him,  as  he  says,  "  a  disrelish  for  the  whole  busi- 
ness," and  he  saw  very  little  more  of  it. 

There  were  other  things,  regarded  by  the  public  as  delusions, 
humbugs,  or  "  isms,"  to  which  The  Tribune  gave  respectful 
treatment,  and  all  the  errors  of  which  its  editor  was  supposed 
to  endorse !  In  religion  he  was  heterodox ;  he  thought  society 
was  organized  on  a  system  essentially  vicious;  he  drank  neither 
wine  nor  spirituous  liquors;  he  lived  on  Graham  bread  and 
other  plain  food;  he  had  even  given  "the  Millerites"  room  in 
The  Tribune  to  predict  the  speedy  destruction  of  the  world ; 


"ISMS."  159 

he  did  not  condemn  spiritualism  without  a  hearing,  and  never 
unreservedly;  he  thought  there  might  be  something  in  phre- 
nology; he  was  sure  every  body  ought  to  have  a  fair  show;  he 
assailed  capital  punishment,  and  actually  made  grim  fun  of  the 
gallows.  A  man  whose  "  isms  "  could  be  summed  up  in  all 
these  singularities  and  more  must  be  a  dangerous  man  and  his 
paper  a  mischievous  journal! 

The  fact  is,  there  is  no  error,  no  "  humbug,"  which  has 
received  the  considerate  approval  of  eminent  minds,  which  is 
not  entitled  to  a  candid  examination  by  every  one  who  loves 
truth  for  truth's  sake.  And  it  is  especially  the  duty  of  a 
public  journalist,  the  conductor  of  a  metropolitan  newspaper, 
to  look  out  for  new  ideas,  as  well  as  for  new  events,  and  give 
them  careful,  honest  investigation.  They  may  not  be  what  is 
claimed  for  them.  Very  well;  then  they  can  be  intelligently 
condemned.  Since  many  of  the  now  universally  recognized 
truths  of  science  were  at  first  generally  condemned  as  wicked 
errors,  it  ill  becomes  any  public  journalist  to  hold  fast  that 
which  we  have  as  embracing  all  that  is  truthful,  or  all  that  is 
valuable.  One  reason  why  The  New- York  Tribune  became  the 
most  influential  of  American  public  journals  is  to  be  found  in 
the  fact  that  Horace  Greeley  refused  no  cause,  no  "  ism,"  not 
evidently  immoral,  a  candid  examination.  And  when  we 
impartially  and  fully  consider  the  many  "  isms "  to  whose 
claims  he  gave  respectful  attention,  the  few  he  ever  adopted 
himself,  we  cannot  but  be  struck  with  wonder  at  his  catholic 
spirit,  his  courage,  and  his  surpassing  wisdom  as  a  journalist. 


CHAPTER    £. 

FINAL  DEFEAT  OF  HENRY  CLAY. 

The  Presidential  Campaign  of  1844 — Henry  Clay  the  Whig  Candidate  fo. 
President — Other  Candidates — "The  Clay  Tribune"  —  Mr.  Greeley'a 
Labours  with  Tongue  and  Voice  —  George  D.  Prentice  of  the  Louisville 
Journal — An  Animated  Campaign — Defeat — Mr.  Greeley  Greatly  Dis- 
satisfied with  this  Result — His  Opinion  of  Henry  Clay. 

MR.  GREELEY  attended  the  National  Convention  of  the  Whig 
party  which  assembled  at  the  city  of  Baltimore  on  the  1st  of 
May,  1844.  No  name  was  mentioned  in  connexion  with  tho 
nomination  for  the  Presidency  except  that  of  Henry  Clay,  of 
Kentucky,  who  was  nominated  amid  stirring  excitement  fry 
acclamation.  Mr.  Clay  was  thus  for  the  fifth  time  presented 
as  a  candidate  for  the  most  exalted  official  position  in  the 
republic.  Twice  he  had  been  defeated  by  the  people;  twice 
in  national  conventions  of  his  own  party.  But  at  this  time 
his  popularity  with  the  Whigs  was  at  its  height.  He  never 
had  been  defeated  by  them  except  on  the  ground  of  expediency. 
Horace  Greeley  himself,  whose  devoted  aifection  for  and  hearty 
admiration  of  Mr.  Clay  were  greater  than  were  ever  called 
forth  by  any  other  public  man,  and  were,  perhaps,  in  some 
respects  undiscrimiuating,  nevertheless  opposed  his  nomina- 
tion, as  we  have  seen,  in  the  Harrisburgh  convention  of 
December,  1839,  there  supporting  General  Harrison.  But  in 
1844,  the  situation  was  entirely  different.  The  desertion  of 
the  Whigs  by  President  Tyler,  who  entered  the  Executive 
ollice  on  the  decease  of  Harrison,  had  indeed  been  of  great 
apparent  advantage  to  the  Democratic  party,  whose  successes 
in  the  years  immediately  following  the  wild  campaign  of  1840 
seemed  fully  to  sustain  Mr.  Yan  Buren's  appeal  "  to  the  sober 
second  thought  of  the  people."  But,  on  the  other  hand,  Mr. 
Clay  had  made  a  series  of  public  addresses  in  the  West  which 
were  listened  to  by  vast  concourses  of  people,  and  had  kept 

(160) 


"CLA'f   ANT   ZT^JJ^HUYSEN."  161 

hi  nanr.  and  fa*nc  prominently  before  the  public  though  at 
tiie  time  he  held  no  office.  One  of  these  meetings  was 
aKcpestionably  among  the  greatest  public  gatherings  ever 
corvened  on  our  continent.  I  refer  to  the  "  Dayton  (Ohio) 
Barbecue"  of  1842.  Many  thousands  of  men  still  living  will 
recollect  this  vast  multitude  of  people  gathered  together  from 
»nany  States,  as  among  the  great  days  of  political  conflict. 
No  voice  could  penetrate  such  a  prodigious  crowd,  but  Robert 
0.  Schenck  fulrnined  forth  a  remarkable  introductory  address 
in  four  words,  which,  on  account  of  his  tremendous  exertions, 
were  generally  heard:  "Fellow-Citizens, — Henry  Clay!"  No 
name  was  then  so  popular.  And  Mr.  Clay  undoubtedly  grew 
*.n  popularity  with  his  party  friends  from  this  time  forth  until 
>-LU  defeat  in  1844. 

n'here  was,  however,  an  animated  contest  in  the  Convention 
on  the  candidate  for  Yice-President,  Theodore  Frelinghuysen, 
of  New  Jersey,  John  Davis,  of  Massachusetts,  Millard  Fill- 
more,  of  New  York,  and  John  Sergeant,  of  Pennsylvania, 
being  the  competitors.  Mr.  Frelinghuysen  was  at  length 
nominated.  He  was  a  statesman  of  liberal  views,  a  man  of 
general  culture,  a  most  admirable  representative  of  the  Chris- 
tian gentleman.  About  the  only  objection  which  delegates 
raised  against  Mr.  Frelinghuysen  was  that  his  preposterous 
name  could  not  be  got  into  songs !  They  were  thinking  of 
"Tippecanoe  and  Tyler  too."  They  discovered  that  they 
underestimated  the  versatile  genius  of  the  poetasters;  for  the 
very  next  morning  after  nomination  readers  of  the  Whig 
journals  of  Baltimore  discovered,  to  the  tuna  of  several  well 
known  airp,  that 

'•' the  country  is  rising 

For  Harry  Clay  and  Frelinghuysen.'- 

The  Democratic  National  Convention  assembled,  in  the  same 
city  near  the  cUse  of  Mf.y,  and  after  an  earnest  struggle  and 
with  the  help  of  "tne  two-thirds  rule"  defeated  Mr.  Van 
Buren.  nominating  James  K".  Polk,  of  Tennessee,  on  the  ninth 
ballot.  The  distinguished  Silas  Wright,  of  New  York, 
II 


162  UFE   O..'    HORACE  GREELEY 

nominated  for  Vice-Preside  it,  but  oe  Jini^g    Mr.  G<*?rge  !£. 
Dallas,  of  Pennsylvania,  was  selected. 

But  more  than  eight  months  before  the  Whig  Convention 
the  "Liberal  Party"  had  held  a  convention  in  the  city  of 
Buffalo  which  had  placed  James  G.  Birnay,  o^  Michiga^  in 
nomination  for  the  Presidency,  and  Thomas  Morris,  of  Ohio, 
for  the  Vice-Presidency.  The  platform  adopted  by  this  Euffalo 
Convention  was  strongly  anti-slavery,  radical,  brave,  and  wise . 

Mr.  Greeley  entered  into  the  campaign  of  1844  wuh  even 
more  enthusiasm,  if  possible,  than  he  had  laboured  for  Gen- 
eral Harrison  four  years  before.  In  addition  to  the  regular 
editions  of  The  Tribune  he  published  The  Clay  Tribune, — ••* 
campaign  journal  similar  to  The  Log-Cabin  of  1840.  T.t  ha  A 
a  very  large  circulation  and  great  influence.  The  regul^.' 
circulation  of  The  Daily  Tribune  was  at  this  time  a!:  ^ut 
15,000  copies,  that  of  The  Weekly  Tribune  immensely  more. 
So  that  what  with  these  and  the  Clay  Tribune  for  the  cam- 
paign, Mr.  Greeley  might  well  be  thought  to  have  had  enough 
to  do  in  the  performance  of  his  duties  in  The  Tribune  office. 
Nevertheless,  he  made  many  public  speeches  in  behalf  of  the 
cause,  and  undoubtedly  gave  more  hours  to  the  work  than  any 
of  his  fellow-countrymen.  He  has  himself  described  his 
labours  in  the  campaign: 

"I  have  admired  and  trusted  many  statesmen:  I  profoundly  loved 
Henry  Clay.  Though  a  slaveholder,  he  was  a  cnampion  of  Gradual 
Emancipation  when  Kentucky  formed  her  first  State  Constitution  in  his 
early  ii&nhood;  and  was  openly  the  same  when  sl>e  ca.ne  to  revise  it,  half 
a  ceotuiy  later.  He  was  a  conservative  in  the  true  sense  of  that  much- 
abased  tevm:  satisfied  to  hold  by  the  present  until  he  cc rid  see  clearly 
how  to  exchange  it  for  the  better;  but  his  was  no  oostmate,  bigoted  con- 
Bervatism,  but  such  as  became  an  intelligent  and  patriotic  American. 
From  his  first  entrance  into  Congress,  he  had  been  a  zealous  and  effective 
champion  of  Internal  Improvements,  the  Protection  of  Home  Industry,  a 
sound  and  uniform  National  Currency, — those leadinp  fextires  of  a  com- 
p/ehensive,  beneficent  National  policy  which  commanded  the  fullest 
assent  of  iry  judgment  and  the  best  exertion;:  of  nuj  voice  and  pen.  I 
lo/ed  him  for  his  generous  nature,  his  gallant  bearing,  his  thrilling 
eloquence,  and  his  life-long  devotion  to  what  1  deemed  our  country's 
unity,  prosperity,  and  just  renown.  Hence,  from  the  day  of  his  nomina- 
tion In  May  to  thuD  or  his  defeat  in  ITovember,  I  gave  every  hour,  every 
effort,  every  thought,  to  his  election.  My  wife  ana  thea  surviving  child 


(our  third)  spent  the  Summer  at  a  farm  h.oi,s3  in  a  i  c.^al  towns"  >.ip  of  "Wassa 
chusetts,  while  I  ^ave  heart  and  soul  tc  the  caavaSa.  i  trs'e1!^!  and 
spoke  much;  I  vrro^e,  1  tliink,  an  average  of  thrac  coiumny  o*  Tha 
Tribuue  each  secular  daj  ;  and  I  gave  the  residue  01  the  hours  I  eouli 
save  frtJm  sleep  to  watching  the  canvass,  and  doing  whatever  I  eo'ild  t~> 
render  our  side  of  it  mo-e  effective.  Very  often,  I  crept  to  *ny  l^dgi'  g 
near  the  office  at  2  to  3  A.  M.,  with  my  head  so  heated  by  fourteen  to  six- 
teen hours  of  incessant  reading  and  writing,  that  I  couid  only  win  sleep 
by  means  of  copious  affusions  from  a  shower-bath;  a^d  these,  while  th^  - 
probably  saved  me  from  a  dangerous  fever,  brought  out  such  znyriadp  of 
boils,  that  —  though  I  did  not  heed  them  till  aft?r  the  battle  waa  f  >agY 
out  and.  lost  —  I  was  covered  by  them  for  the  six  months  ?nsuing,  or  ten 
fifty  or  sixty  at  once,  so  that  I  could  contrive  no  pos'tioa  in  which  to  rest, 
but  passed  night  after  night  in  an  easy-chai  .  And  these  unwelco-". 
visitors  returned  to  plague  me,  though  less  severely,  jhroughout  the  .o- 
lowing  Winter."  l 


Perhaps  the  only  journalist  m  the  country  who 
during  this  campaign  with  an  enthusiasm  a,nd  spirit  01  £-3"'  - 
sacrifice  equal  to  those  of  Mr.  Greeley,  was  Mr.  George  ). 
Prentice,  of  The  Louisville  Journal.  A  New  Englande?*  ), 
birth,  with  instincts  opposed  to  slavery,  Mr.  Prentice  had  cn>. 
to  Kentucky  in  early  manhood  and  established  a  journal  ij  tne 
greatest  commercial  city  of  the  State.  A  poet  of  rare  genius, 
a  writer  of  paragraphs  which  for  wit  and  humour  had  never 
been  approached,  he  soon  became  greatly  influential  ;  and  all 
the  sooner,  doubtless,  in  Southern  society,  because  he  was  a 
good  shot  and  not  a  non-combatant.  lie  had  written  a  biogra- 
phy of  Henry  Clay,  and  was  greatly,  devotedly  attached  to  him, 
personally  and  politically.  He  also  published  a  campaign 
paper,  —  called  The  Jouisviile  Journal  —  Extra,  —  which  had  an 
immense  circulation  in  many  Southern  States  and  the  North- 
west. Known  to  be  in  Mr.  Clay's  confidence,  Mr.  Prentice's 
journal  was  regarded  by  active  politicians  as  an  autlvority,  and 
was  constantly  consulted  by  them  in  all  parts  of  the  country. 
Had  Mr.  Prentice  possessed  the  newspaper  "machinery"  had 
by  Mr.  Greeley,  The  Louisville  Journal  would  have  been  more 
generally  circulated,  perhaps,  during  the  campaign  of  1844 
than  The  New-  York  Tribune.  As  it  was,  it  may  safely  be 
gaid  to  have  originated  more  of  the  fun  of  the  campaign  than 

1  Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life,  pp.  167-68. 


!C.<  LIKE  OF  HORACE  CRES.JEY. 

all  tlie  otner  Whig  jemrals  combined.  .Wr  Greeley  being 
"terriSly  in  earnest,''*  could  not  have  had  *  more  powerful 
oily  than  be  found  in  Mr.  Pventice;  w*v,  .il<>o,  was  no  less  in 
earnest,  no  less  heartiiy  devoted  to  car-se  and  chosen  leader, 
&\  a  who  wrote  many  grave  and  powerful  articles,  which  would 
have  received  roore  attention  and  exerted  more  influence  than 
they  did,  had  ili3y  not  been  surrounded  by  a  fairly  bewildering 
display  of  wit,  p,nd  retorts  so  lively  that  they  might  have  split 
*.he  very  sides  of  cofnnc.  Though  Mr.  Prentice's  "  heavy  work  " 
was  great  aiid  in  itself  of  the  greatest  merit,  it  was  the  lighter 
effervescences  of  his  mind  which  won  the  popular  attention. 
J&cn  sometimes  forge  i;  the  sublime  heavens  in  the  midst  of  a 
iisplay  of  sizzing  pyrotechnics. 

'"Hie  campaign  of  1844  was  only  less  animated  than  that  of 
f  ~-C.  The  "  machinery  "  was  substantially  the  same,  differing 
r>  •  y  m  details.  There  was  no  end  of  Clay  and  Frelinghnysen 
~l*y  i*1  and  the  old  Tippecanoe  glee-clubs  were  revived,  and 
-i  a./;*  n?w  ones  formed.  Log-cabins  and  hard  cider  had,  in- 
ucoc'.  become  obsolete,  but  barbecues,  liberty-pole  raisings 
( ^\"iig  poles  being  of  ash,  Democratic  of  hickory),  processions, 
and  general  enthusiasm  were  common  throughout  the  country. 
Instead  of  the  log-cabin,  the  raccoon  became  the  popular  em- 
blem of  the  Whigs.  Mr.  YanBuren  had  been  dubbed  "  the  sly 
fox  of  Kinderhook."  Some  one,  in  allusion  to  Mr.  Clay's  pre- 
vious candidacies,  had  spoken  of  the  Whigs  as  eternally  hunting 
after  "  that  same  old  coon."  And  "  that  same  old  coon  "  was 
taken  up  by  the  Whigs  very  much  as  the  log-cabin  had  been 
four  years  previously.  Every  procession  to  a  barbecue  or  mass 
meeting  would  have  several  wagons  in  which  were  elevated 
small  trees,  made  interesting  and  lively  by  the  presence  of  a 
number  of  raccoons.  It  almost  seems  that  if  Mr.  Clay  had 
been  elected,  the  raccoon  would  have  displaced  the  eagle  in  our 
national  escutcheon.  The  writer  of  this  volume  once  counted 
more  than  twenty  raccoons — two  or  three  of  them  white — in 
a  single  Clay  procession.  As  he  had  several  times  gone  "  coon 
hunting,"  without  a  shadow  of  success, — unless  a  single  opos- 
sum on  one  occasion  may  be  counted  such, — he  greatly  won- 


CF   HENRY   CL/y.  A,K> 

dered  where  dl  the  coons  cane  from.    The  market  was  brie: 
during  the  campaign,  but  after  election  prices  collapsed. 

Mr.  Clay  was  defeated,  his  opponent  receiving  170  votes  cf 
the  electoral  college,  he  receiving  105  This  result  was  ev 
tremsly  distasteful  to  Mr.  Greeley.  He  was  not  among  those 
who  thought  Mr.  Clay  would  go  through  with  a  hurrah,  or. 
account  of  the  fact  that  Mr  Polk  was  comparatively  unknown, 
lie  knew  that  only  restless  labour,  the  best  exertions  of  ill 
working  Whigs,  and  the  appliance  of  every  honourable  meaLc 
of  influence  would  secure  success.  A  warmer  friend  and  moic 
unselfish  admirer  of  Mr.  Clay  than  most  men,  his  judgment 
was  not  put  at  fault  by  his  feelings,  and  he  almost  ruined  liii' 
constitution  by  the  work  that  he  imposed  upon  himsel-. 
Years  afterwards,  he  maintained  with  undoubted  sincerity  t.  :• 
•yith  questionable  correctness,  that  the  victory  would  have  b  ;er* 
with  Mr.  Clay  had  the  friends  of  Protection  liberally  expended 
their  money  in  that  behalf,  supplying  the  people  with  The 
Tribune  and  other  Whig  journals  to  juch  extent  that  all  voters 
might  have  had  an  opportunity  to  read  Whig  arguments.  Mr. 
Greeley  was  probably  mistaken.  As  the  people  defeated  Mr. 
Clay  with  a  gentleman  so  little  known  as  Mr.  Polk  was  at  that 
time,  it  seems  reasonable  to  conclude  that  no  earthly  power 
could  have  induced  them  to  elevate  the  Kentucky  statesman 
to  the  chief  magistracy.  However  this  may  be,  it  is  certain 
that  Mr.  Greeley  never  became  reconciled  to  the  result,  an-i 
lamented  it  as  a  public  calamity  whenevei  a^erward?  he  spcks 
of  it. 

Mr.  Greeley  had  a  most  exalted,  perhaps  sxtra^agintj  o->i>  - 
i">n  of  Henry  Clay.     He  says  of  him: 

"  Mr.  Clay,  born  in  poverty  and  obscurity,  had  not  even  a  commor- 
scbool  education,  and  bad  only  a  few  months'  clerkship  in  a  store,  with  r. 
somewhat  longer  training  in  a  lawyer's  office,  as  preparation  for  his  grea ; 
career.  Tall  in  person,  though  plain  in  features,  graceful  in  manner,  ana 
at  once  dignified  and  aftable  in  bearing,  I  think  his  fervid  patriotism  and 
thrilling  eloquence  combined  with  decided  natural  abilities  and  a  wid3 
and  varied  experience  to  render  him  the  American  more  fitted  to  win  a-d 
enjo}  popularity  than  any  other  who  has  lived.  That  popularity  I 
steadi.  y  achieved  and  extended  through  the  earlier  half  of  his  long  )uolio 
'ife;  ')ut  he  was  now  confronted  by  a  political  combination  well-  t\gi 


J66  -JPE   CF  HORACE   GSEELFT. 

. .  vincible,  based  on  the  potent  personal  strcugih  of  General  Jackson ,  ina 
tM<*  overcame  hi:_n.  Five  times  presented  as  a  candidate  for  President,  h  j 
iVS  always  beaten, — twice  in  conventions  of  his  political  associates,  thr^o 
in  J«e  choice  of  electors  by  the  people.  The  ca-elcss  reader  of  our  history 
in  future  centuries  will  scarcely  realize  the  force  of  nis  personal  magnet- 
isnr,  nor  conceive  how  millions  of  hearts  glowed  with  sanguine  hopes  of 
^1  s  election  to  the  Presidency,  and  bitterly  lamented  his  and  their  disccm- 
Lture."  * 

In  accounting  for  the  defeat  of  Clay,  Mr.  Greeley,  in  after 
years,  attributed.it,  so  far  as  ge'neral  2auses  were  concerned,  to 
¥i.r.  Clay's  paltering  on  the  question  of  the  annexation  of 
L^exas,  on  the  one  band,  and  to  Mr.  Pclk's  paltering,  on  the 
question  of  the  Tariff,  on  the  other.  These,  he  thought,  wen, 
he  "  great  issues  "  of  the  campaign.  And  as  Mr.  Clay,  in  his 
t  Jabama  letters,  stated  that  he  did  not  object  to  the  annexation 
-••  A'exas  on  account  of  slavery,  thereby  losing  the  most  of  the 
;  Liberal "  vote  of  the  North,  and  gaining  nothing  in  tin, 
Gonth;  and  as  Mr.  Polk,  in  his  ''  Kane  lettei,"  came  out  in 
favour  of  "incidental  protection,"  thus  enabling  him  to  beat 
Mr.  Clay  in  Pennsylvania,  though  this  would  defeat  such  "  pro- 
tection "  as  Pennsylvania  desired,  the  people  were  misled  in 
regard  to  either  candidate,  and  that  upon  the  vital  issues  of  the 
campaign. 

Herein  Mr.  Greeley  was  to  a  certain  extent  correct,  and  it  is 
astonishing  that  he  did  not  see  that  Mr.  Clay's  paltering  course 
was  alnost  infinitely  worse  than  that  of  Mr.  Polk;  and  this 
for  the  reason  that  Cie  Texas  question  was  almost  infinitely 
more  important  than  the  Tariff  question, — as  events^iave  since 
a:r.ndantly  shown.  Mr.  Clay  equivocated  upon  the  great 
question;  Mr.  Polk  upon  the  little  one.  The  abolitionists  saw 
this  with  perfect  distinctness,  and  wisely  preferred  to  "  throw 
•Mvay  their  votes "  upon  Mr.  Birney  rather  than  more  thai 
w.vste  them  upon  Mr.  Clay.  The  Whigs  had  not  adopted  any 
platform  further  than  a  resolution  that  Whig  principles  might 
be  summed  up  as  embracing  a  well  regulated  national  currency; 
"  a  Tariff  for  revenue  to  defray  the  necessary  expenses  of  tht 
(  -".^rnment,  and  discriminating  wi*h  special  reference  to  the 

*„»<*.,  p.  168. 


DEFEAT  OF   HEKRY   CLAY. 


167 


protection  of  the  domestic  labour  of  the  country;  "  the  distri- 
bution of  the  proceeds  from  the  sales  of  the  public  lands;  a 
single  term  for  the  Presidency;  reform  of  executive  usurpation. 
It  would  have  been  more  correct,  if  the  convention  had  said 
that  Whig  principles  might  be  summed  up  in  Henry  Clay. 

The  nation  was  wiser  than  Mr.  Greeley.  But  he  never 
ceased  to  lament  the  defeat  of  Mr.  Clay,  or  to  regard  him  vith 
an  affection  and  admiration  of  the  most  devoted  anH  c-ily^ri . 
nature.  We  shall  see  that  his-  friendship  remained  stcs-t^&st 
to  the  last.  Even  so  late  as  when  he  wrote  his  '  ^  mer"  ^an 
Conflict,"  his  still  enduring  love  for  Clay  made  him  bLvost 
excuse  the  measures  generally  known  as  the  Compromise  of 
1850.  It  would  appear  to  be  certain  that  Mr.  Greeley  never 
discovered  that  slavery  had  demoralized  even  the  generous, 
chivalric  "  Harry  of  the  West." 


SARAH   MARGARET  FULLER.— See  pages  170,  etc. 


CHAPTEK    XI. 

CONTINUATION  OF  TRIBUNE  HISTORY. 

v;:e  Tiibune  dnd  Literature  —  Inaugurates  A  New  Era  of  Criticism — Ert- 
jrii*  A.  Poe — A  High-Priced  Autograph —  The  Tribune  Brings  Out  the 
'iTanscendentalists —  Margaret  Fuller ;  Her  Contributions  to  the  Trib- 
dae--->.Ir  Greeley's  Tribute  to  Her  Genius — Notices  of  American 
Psaiale  Journalists — Charles  Dickens — Mr.  Greeley's  Early  Recogni- 
tion of  his  Genius — His  First  Visit  to  America — Washington  Irving's 
"  Break  Down  "  at  the  Dickens  Dinner — Mr.  Dickens's  Second  Visit — 
Mr.  Greeley  Presides  at  the  New-York  Dinner — A  Notable  Gathering 
—  Mr.  Greeley's  Great  Services  to  Literature  —  Contributions  of  Tribune 
Writers  to  Permanent  Literature. 

THE  TEIBUNE  was  generous,  catholic  in  spirit  toward  current 
literature  from  the  day  of  its  establishment.  Until  it  inaugu- 
rated a  new  era  of  criticism,  exclusively  literary  journals  alone 
were  generally  consulted  by  scholars  and  thinkers  for  intelli- 
gence as  to  books,  the  arts  and  sciences,  the  current  labour,  in 
short,  of  scholars  and  thinkers.  Ponderous  quarterly  Reviews 
had  for  nearly  half  a  century  been  regarded  as  guides  in  all 
such  matters;  though  monthly  magazines, — particularly  Black- 
wood's,  of  Edinburgh,  Scotland,  while  under  the  editorship  of 
John  Wilson, — were  not  wanting,  which  discussed  literature, 
science,  art,  and  politics  with  a  brilliancy  of  criticism  and  a 
splendid  flow  of  vituperation  not  surpassed  by  the  most  dash- 
ing daily  journalist  of  the  year  1873.  Of  those  journals  which 
were  called  literary,  the  one  in  New- York  which  attained  the 
largest  influence  during  the  early  years  of  The  Tribune,  was  The 
Weekly  Mirror,  afterwards  The  Home  Journal,  of  which  the 
editors  were  the  distinguished  poet,  N.  P.  Willis,  and  the  no 
less  distinguished  song- writer,  George  P.  Morris.  Mr.  Greeley 
became  well  acquainted  with  these  gentlemen,  and  other  men 
of  letters  who  contributed  to  their  journal,  making  it  a  sort  of 
literary  "  organ,"  and  authority  for  "  the  upper  ten," — a  phrase 
which  is  said  to  have  originated  with  Mr.  Willia.  • 


AUTC5KAln. 


-mor.g  tno  celebrated  literary  men  with  whom  Mr.  Gree'e 
oecarne  quite  intimately  acquainted  was  Edgar  A.  Poe,  author 
0^  "  The  Eaven,"  and  other  poems  of  rare  beauty  and  power, 
in  V3ll  as  of  a  number  of  tales  exhibiting  remarkable  acumen 
anu  powers  of  analysis.  Poe  was  no  less  brilliant  as  a  convcr- 
sr  ulrnisL  than  he  was  as  a  writer,  but  he  was  irregular  in  habLd 
a'ld  careless  in  business  matters.  Long  after  the  poet's  death, 
ML-.  Greeley  received  the  following  letter: 


Srn:  —  In  your  extensive  correspondency  you  aave  undoabted  y 
secured  several  autographs  of  the  late  distinguishec1.  American  poet,  Ed^tu 
A.  Poe.  If  so,  will  you  please  favour  me  with  one,  and  oblige, 

"  Yours,  respectfully,  A.  3." 

To  which  Mr,  Greeley  replied: 


SIR:  —  I  happen  to  have  in  my  possession  but  one,  avtogrtn-i  « 
the  late  distinguished  American  poet,  Edgar  A.  Poe.  It  consists  of  at  •  . 
O.  U.,  with  my  name  on  the  back  of  it.  It  cost  me  just  $50,  and  you  vji 
have  it  for  half  price. 

"Yours,  HORACE  Ci^njEL.^  ." 

Poor  Poe  had  said  that  genius  might  almost  be  defined  as 
the  faculty  of  acquiring  poverty.  There  was  some  sad  self- 
love  in  this,  doubtless;  and,  let  us  hope,  his  early  death  alone 
prevented  him  from  relieving  Mr.  Greeley  of  the  necessity  of 
paying  an  exorbitant  price  for  the  poet's  autograph.  However 
this  may  be,  Poe  was  popular  as  poet  and  critic,  and  did  all  he 
could  in  the  literary  world  to  cast  contempt  and  ridicule  upon 
"  the  Transcendentalists,"  as  a  certain  number  of  writers,  at  the 
head  of  whom  was  Ralph  Waldo  Emerson,  were  called.  Thus, 
and  by  reason  of  other  influences,  the  Transcendentalists  were 
made  to  appear  as  decidedly  heterodox  in  the  literary  church. 
They  became  a  common  target  for  innumerable  paper-bullets 
of  the  brain  ;  so  that  it  was  well  nigh  a  reproach  to  be  a  Trans- 
cendentalist  or  an  admirer  of  the  school. 

Mr.  Greeley  proceeded  with  great  vigour  to  put  an  end  to 
this  small  business.  The  Transcendentalists  were  simply 
reformers  in  literature;  believers  in  enlarging  the  realm  of 
thought,  in  ensmalling  the  sphere  of  mere  authority.  They 
proposed  to  themselves  to  elevate  the  recognized  standard  of 


iiC  J-1FE  OF  HORACE  GKEEL^T. 

^pinion,  whether  ox  religion  or  what  not.  Not  Insisting  4-i  <-t 
there  is  (absolutely)  anything  new  under  the  sun,  they  believed 
in  the  still  further  improvement  of  the  human  mind  by  ne~ 
viethods,  and  that  the  happiness  of  the  race  could  be  v.  s*lt- 
increased.  It  was  their  high  ideal  which  gave  them  the  najie 
of  Transcendental ists.  They  established  a  quarterly  pullic*- 
tion  at  Boston,  called  The  Dial,  of  which  Sarah  Margaret  Full  jr 
became  the  editor,  with  Ralph  "Waldo  Emerson  and  Geo  'ge 
.^pley  as  assistants.  After  a  time  Mr.  Emerson  became  the 
editor,  with  his  predecessor  as  chief  assistant,  but  with  little 
real  change  To  these  reformers  The  Tribune  extended  hearty 
welcome.  Mr.  Greeley  at  once  and  forever  appreciated  their 
thought,  their  unselfishness,  their  sublime  endeavour,  and  did 
'xll  in  his  power  to  bring  the  world  to  his  opinion.  Margaret 

-T'.er  herself  became  connected  with  The  Tribune  in  the  latter 
j-*-t  of  ISM,  and  continued  to  be  literary  editor  up  to  August 
lc  ~6,  when  she  departed  for  Europe. 

This  acquaintance  made  the  heroic  period  of  Mr.  Greeley 's 
life.  He  gives  a  full  account  of  it  in  an  article  published  in 
her  memoirs,  which  will  rightly  find  place  here: 

"My  first  acquaintance  with  Margaret  Fuller  was  made  through  the 
pages  of  The  Dial.  The  lofty  range  an .1  rare  ability  of  that  work,  and  its 
un-American  richness  of  culture  and  ripeness  of  thought,  naturally  filled 
the  'fit  audience,  though  few,' with  a  high  estimate  of  those  who  were 
known  as  its  conductors  and  principal  writers.  Yet  I  do  not  now  remem- 
ber that  any  article,  which  strongly  impressed  me,  was  recognized  as  from 
the  pen  of  its  female  editor,  prior  to  the  appearance  of  'The  Great  Law- 
Buit,'  afterwards  matured  into  the  volume  more  distinctively,  yet  not  quite 
accurately,  entitled  '  Woman  in  the  Nineteenth  Century.'  I  think  this  can 
hardly  have  failed  to  make  a  deep  impression  on  the  mind  of  every 
thoughtful  reader,  as  the  production  of  an  original,  vigorous,  and  earnest 
mind.  'Summer  on  the  Lakes,'  which  appeared  some  time  after  that 
essay,  though  before  its  expansion  into  a  book,  struck  me  as  less  ambitious 
in  its  aim,  but  more  graceful  and  delicate  in  its  execution ;  and  as  one  of 
the  clearest  and  most  graphic  delineations  ever  given  of  the  Great  Lakes, 
of  the  Prairies,  and  of  the  receding  barbarism,  and  the  rapidly  advancing, 
cut  rude,  repulsive  semi-civilization,  which  were  contending  with  most 
unequal  forces  for  the  possession  of  those  rich  lands.  I  still  consider 
'  Summer  on  the  Lakes'  unequalled,  especially  in  its  pictures  of  the  Prairies, 
and  of  the  sunnier  aspect  of  Pioneer  life. 

"Yet,  it  was  the  suggestion  of  Mrs.  Greeley — who  had  spent  some  weeks 
of  successive  seasons  in  or  near  Boston,  and  who  had  there  made  the  per- 


MARGAKET  FULLER.  . .    A 

B''  jal  acquaintance  of  Miss  Fuller,  and  formed  a,  very  high  estim.tle  of  and 
\rarm  attachment  for  her — that  induced  me,  in  the  autumn  of  1844,  to  offer 
Lar  terms,  which  were  accepted,  for  her  assistance  in  the  literary  depar*. 
nent  of  The  Tribune.  A  home  in  my  family  was  included  in  the  stipule*- 
t  on.  I  was  myself  barely  acquainted  with  her  when  she  thus  came  to 
reside  with  us,  and  ".  did  not  fully  appreciate  her  noble'-  qualities  for  some 
i  onths  afterward.  Though  we  were  members  ci  the  same  household,  we 
scarcely  met  save  at  breakfast ;  and  my  time  and  thoughts  were  absorbed 
in  duties  and  cares,  which  left  me  little  leisure  or  indication  for  the 
amenities  of  rocial  intercourse.  Fortune  seemed  to  delight  in  placing  us 
two  in  relations  of  friendly  antagonism — or  rather  to  develop  all  possible 
contrasts  in  our  ideas  and  social  habits.  She  was  naturally  inclined  tc 
luxury,  and  a  good  appearance  before  the  world.  My  pride,  if  I  had  any, 
delighted  in  bare  walls  and  rugged  fare.  She  was  addicted  to  strong  teu 
and  coffee,  both  of  which  I  rejected  and  condemned,  even  in  the  mos«; 
homoeopathic  dilutions;  while,  my  general  health  being  sound,  and  hers 
sadly  impaired,  I  could  not  fail  to  find  in  her  dietetic  habits  t'he  cause 
of  her  almost  habitual  illness;  and  once,  while  we  were  still  barely 
acquainted,  when  she  came  to  the  breakfast-table  with  a  very  severe  head- 
ache, I  was  tempted  to  attribute  it  to  her  strong  potations  of  the  Chinese 
leaf  the  night  before.  She  told  me  quite  frankly  that  she  '  declined  being 
lectured  on  the  food  or  beverage  she  saw  fit  to  take,'  which  was  but 
reasonable  in  one  who  had  arrived  at  her  maturity  of  intellect  and  fixed- 
ness of  habits.  So  the  subject  was  thenceforth  tacitly  avoided  between  us ; 
but,  though  words  were  suppressed,  looks  and  involuntary  gestures  cculd 
not  so  well  be;  and  an  utter  divergency  of  views  on  this  and  kindred 
themes  created  a  perceptible  distance  between  us. 

"Her  earlier  contributions  to  The  Tribune  were  not  her  best,  and  I  c*id 
not  at  first  prize  her  aid  so  highly  as  I  afterward  learned  to  do.  She  wroie 
always  freshly,  vigorously,  but  not  always  clearly ;  for  her  full  and  lnt!- 
mate  acquaintance  with  Continental  literature,  especially  German,  seemed 
to  have  marred  her  felicity  and  readiness  of  expression  in  her  mothe* 
tongue.  While  I  never  met  another  woman  who  conversed  more  freely  or 
lucidly,  the  attempt  to  commit  her  thoughts  to  paper  seemed  to  induce  a 
singular  embarrassment  and  hesitation.  She  could  write  only  when  m 
the  vein,  and  this  needed  often  to  be  waited  for  through  several  days, 
while  the  occasion  sometimes  required  an  immediate  utterance.  The  new 
book  must  be  reviewed  before  other  journals  had  thoroughly  dissected 
and  discussed  it,  else  the  ablest  critique  would  command  no  general 
attention,  and  perhaps  be,  by  the  greater  number,  unread.  That  the  writer 
should  wait  the  flow  of  inspiration,  or  at  least  the  recurrence  of  elasticity 
of  spirits  and  relative  health  of  body,  will  not  seem  unreasonable  to  ths 
general  reader;  but  to  the  inveterate  hack-horse  of  the  daily  p/c-f-a, 
accustomed  to  write  at  any  time,  on  any  subject,  .ar-d  rvith  a  rapidity 
limited  only  by  the  physical  ability  to  form  the  requisite  pen-strokes,  t^  > 
notion  of  waiting  for  a  brighter  day,  or  a  happier  frame  of  mind,  appear* 
fantastic  and  absurd.  He  would  as  soon  think  of  waivirg  for  a  cl'in^c  in 


OF   HORACE   UKEELEY. 

the  noon.,  Hence,  while  I  realized  that  her  contributions  evinced 
intellectual  wealth  and  force,  I  did  not  value  them  as  I  should  have  do  ie 
Lxd  they  been  written  more  fluently  and  promptly.  They  often  seemed  io 
make  their  appearance  '  a  day  after  the  fair.' 

"  One  other  point  of  tacit  antagonism  between  us  may  as  well  be  n<  te1. 
Margaret  war  -I  *  ays  a  iiost  earnest,  devoted  champion  of  the  Emancip.v 
tion  of  Women  from  their  past  and  present  condition  of  inferiority,  to  aa 
independence  of  Men.  She  demanded  for  them  the  fullest  recognition  of 
Social  and  Political  Equality  with  the  rougher  sex ;  the  freest  access  to 
all  btt,ti.'HS,  professions,  employments,  which  are  open  to  any.  To  this 
cnmand  I  heartily  acceded.  It  seemed  to  me,  however,  that  her  clear  per- 
ceptions of  abstract  right  were  often  overborne,  in  practice,  by  the 
influence  of  education  and  habit;  that  while  she  demanded  ahso'ute 
equality  for  Woman,  she  exacted  a  deference  and  courtesy  from  men  ta 
women,  as  women,  which  was  entirely  inconsistent  with  that  requirement. 
In  my  view  the  equalizing  theory  can  be  enforced  only  by  ignoring  the 
habitual  discrimination  of  men  find  women,  as  forming  separate  clattet, 
end  regarding  all  alike  as  simply  persons, — as  human  beings.  So  long  as 
a  lady  shall  deem  herself  in  need  of  some  gentleman's  arm  to  conduct  her 
properly  out  of  a  dining  or  ball-room, — so  long  as  she  shall  consider  it 
dangerous  or  unbecoming  to  walk  half  a  mile  alone  by  night, — I  cannot 
see  how  the  '  Woman's  Rights '  theory  is  ever  to  be  anything  more  than  a 
logically  defensible  abstraction.  In  this  view  Margaret  did  not  at  all 
concur,  and  the  diversity  was  the  incitement  to  much  perfectly  good- 
natured,  but  nevertheless  sharpish  sparring  between  us.  Whenever  she 
said  or  did  anything  implying  the  usual  demand  of  Woman  on  the 
courtesy  and  protection  of  Manhood,  I  was  apt,  before  complying,  to  look 
her  in  the  face  and  exclaim,  with  marked  emphasis, — quoting  from  her 
'Woman  in  the  Nineteenth  Century,' — 'LET  THEM  BE  SEA-CAPTAINS  rp 
THEY  WILL!'  Of  course,  this  was  given  and  received  as  raillery,  but  it  did 
not  tend  to  ripen  our  intimacy  or  quicken  my  esteem  into  admiration. 
Though  no  unkind  word  ever  passed  between  us,  nor  any  approach  to  one, 
yet  we  two  dwelt  for  months  under  the  same  roof,  as  scarcely  more  than 
acquaintances,  meeting  once  a  day  at  a  common  board,  and  having  certain 
business  relations  with  each  other.  Personally,  I  regarded  her  rather  as 
my  wife's  cherished  friend  than  as  my  own,  possessing  many  lofty 
qualities  and  some  prominent  weaknesses,  and  a  good  deal  spoiled  by  the 
unmeasured  flattery  of  her  little  circle  of  inordinate  admirers.  For 
myself,  burning  no  incense  on  any  human  shrine,  I  half-consciously 
tesolved  to  'keep  my  eye-beam  clear,'  and  escape  the  fascination  which 
one  seemed  to  exert  over  the  eminent  and  cultivated  persons,  mainly 
women,  who  came  to  our  out-of-the-way  dwelling  to  visit  her,  and  who 
c:-t,med  generally  to  regard  her  with  a  strangely  Oriental  adoration. 

"But,  as  time  wore  on,  and  I  became  inevitably  better  and  better 
u  jquainted  with  her,  I  found  myself  drawn,  almost  irresistibly,  into  the 
£ij:.tril  current.  Z.  found  that  her  faults  and  weaknesses  were  all  super- 
«ici?u  ?.::  i  obvious  to  the  most  casual,  if  undazzled,  observer.  They  rather 


MAKGAKCT  FULLER.  173 

dwindled  than  expanded  upon  a  fuller  knowledge ;  or  rather,  took  on  new 
and  brighter  aspects  in  the  light  of  her  radiant  and  lofty  soul.  I  learned 
to  know  her  as  a  most  fearless  and  unselfish  champion  of  Truth  and 
Human  Good  at  all  hazards,  ready  to  be  their  standard-bearer  through 
danger  and  obloquy,  and  if  need  be,  their  martyr.  I  think  few  have  more 
keenly  appreciated  the  material  goods  of  life, — Rank,  Riches,  Power, 
Luxury,  Enjoyment;  but  I  know  none  who  would  have  more  cheerfully 
surrendered  them  all,  if  the  well-being  of  our  Race  could  thereby  have 
been  promoted.  I  have  never  met  another  in  whom  the  inspiring  hope 
of  Immortality  was  so  strengthened  into  profoundest  conviction.  She  did 
not  believe  in  our  future  and  unending  existence, — she  knew  it,  and  lived 
ever  in  the  broad  glare  of  its  morning  twilight. 

"With  a  limited  income  and  liberal  wants,  she  was  yet  generous 
beyond  the  bounds  of  reason.  Had  the  gold  of  California  been  all  her 
own,  she  would  have  disbursed  nine-tenths  of  it  in  eager  and  well-directed 
efforts  to  stay,  or  at  least  diminish,  the  flood  of  human  misery.  And  it  is 
but  fair  to  state,  that  the  liberality  she  evinced  was  fully  paralleled  by  the 
liberality  she  experienced  at  the  hands  of  others.  Had  she  needed  thou- 
sands, and  made  her  wants  known  she  had  friends  who  would  have 
cheerfully  supplied  her.  I  think  few  persons,  in  their  pecuniary  dealings, 
have  experienced  and  evinced  more  of  the  better  qualities  of  human 
nature  than  Margaret  Fuller.  She  seemed  to  inspire  those  who  approached 
her  with  that  generosity  which  was  a  part  of  her  nature. 

"  Of  her  writings  I  do  not  propose  to  speak  critically.  I  think  most  of 
her  contributions  to  The  Tribune,  while  she  remained  with  us,  were  char, 
acterized  by  a  directness,  terseness,  and  practicality,  which  are  wanting  in 
some  of  her  earlier  productions.  Good  judges  have  confirmed  my  own 
opinion,  that  while  her  essays  in  The  Dial  are  more  elaborate  and  ambi- 
tious, her  reviews  in  The  Tribune  are  far  better  adapted  to  win  the  favour 
and  sway  the  judgment  of  the  great  majority  of  readers.  But,  one 
characteristic  of  her  writings  I  feel  bound  to  commend,  —  their  absolute 
truthfulness.  She  never  asked  how  this  would  sound,  nor  whether  that 
would  do,  nor  what  would  be  the  effect  of  saying  anything;  but  simply, 
'Is  it  the  truth?  Is  it  such  as  the  public  should  know?'  And  if  her 
judgment  answered,  '  Yes,'  she  uttered  it;  no  matter  what  turmoil  it  might 
excite,  nor  what  odium  it  might  draw  down  on  her  own  head.  Perfect 
conscientiousness  was  an  unfailing  characteristic  of  her  literary  efforts. 
Even  the  severest  of  her  critiques,  —  that  on  Longfellow's  Poems,  —  for 
which  an  impulse  in  personal  pique  has  been  alleged,  I  happen  with 
certainty  to  know  had  no  such  origin.  When  I  first  handed  her  the  book 
to  review,  she  excused  herself,  assigning  the  wide  divergence  of  her  views 
of  Poetry  from  those  of  the  author  and  his  school,  as  her  reason.  She 
thus  induced  me  to  attempt  the  task  of  reviewing  it  myself.  But  day 
after  day  sped  by,  and  I  could  find  no, hour  that  was  not  absolutely 
required  for  the  performance  of  some  duty  that  would  not  be  put  off,  nor 
turned  over  to  another.  At  length  I  carried  the  book  back  to  her  in  utter 
despair  of  ever  finding  an  hour  in  which  even  to  look  through  it;  and,  at 


LIFE  OF  HORACE  GREELEY. 

my  renewed  and  earnest  request,  she  reluctantly  undertook  its  discussion. 
The  statement  of  these  facts  is  but  an  act  of  justice  to  her  memory. 

"  Profoundly  religious,  —  though  her  creed  was,  at  once,  very  broad  and 
very  short,  with  a  genuine  love  for  inferiors  in  social  position,  whom  she 
was  habitually  studying,  by  her  counsel  and  teachings,  to  elevate  and 
improve,  —  she  won  the  confidence  and  affection  of  those  who  attracted 
her,  by  unbounded  sympathy  and  trust.  She  probably  knew  the  cherished 
secrets  of  more  hearts  than  any  one  else,  because  she  freely  imparted  her 
own.  With  a  full  share  both  of  intellectual  and  of  family  pride,  she  pre- 
eminently recognized  and  responded  to  the  essential  brotherhood  of  all 
human  kind,  and  needed  but  to  know  that  a  fellow-being  required  her 
counsel  or  assistance,  to  render  her,  not  merely  willing,  but  eager  to  impart 
it.  Loving  ease,  luxury,  and  the  world's  good  opinion,  she  stood  ready 
to  renounce  them  all,  at  the  call  of  pity  or  of  duty.  I  think  no  one,  not 
radically  averse  to  the  whole  system  of  domestic  servitude,  would  have 
treated  servants,  of  whatever  class,  with  such  uniform  and  thoughtful 
consideration,  —  a  regard  which  wholly  merged  their  factitious  condition 
in  their  antecedent  and  permanent  humanity.  I  think  few  servants  ever 
lived  weeks  with  her,  who  were  not  dignified  and  lastingly  benefited  by 
her  influence  and  her  counsels.  They  might  be  at  first  repelled,  by  what 
seemed  her  too  stately  manner  and  exacting  disposition,  but  they  soon 
learned  to  esteem  and  love  her. 

"I  have  known  few  women,  and  scarcely  another  maiden,  who  had  the 
heart  and  the  courage  to  speak  with  such  frank  compassion,  in  mixed 
circles  of  the  most  degraded  and  outcast  portion  of  the  sex.  The  con- 
templation of  their  treatment,  especially  by  the  guilty  authors  of  their 
ruin,  moved  her  to  a  calm  and  mournful  indignation,  which  she  did  not 
attempt  to  suppress  nor  control.  Others  were  willing  to  pity  and  deplore ; 
Margaret  was  more  inclined  to  vindicate  and  to  redeem.  She  did  not 
hesitate  to  avow  that  on  meeting  some  of  these  abused,  unhappy  sisters, 
she  had  been  surprised  to  find  them  scarcely  fallen  morally  below  the 
ordinary  standard  of  Womanhood, — realizing  and  loathing  their  debase- 
ment; anxious  to  escape  it;  and  only  repelled  bj'the  sad  consciousness 
that  for  them  sympathy  and  society  remained  only  so  long  as  they  should 
persist  in  the  ways  of  pollution.  Those  who  have  read  her  'Woman,'  may 
remember  some  daring  comparisons  therein  suggested  between  these 
Pariahs  of  society  and  large  classes  of  their  respectable  sisters;  and  that 
was  no  fitful  expression,  —  no  sudden  outbreak,  —  but  impelled  by  her 
most  deliberate  convictions.  I  think,  if  she  had  been  born  to  large  for- 
tune, a  house  of  refuge  for  all  female  outcasts  desiring  to  return  to  the 
ways  of  Virtue,  would  have  been  one  of  her  most  cherished  and  first 
realized  conceptions. 

"  Her  love  of  children  was  one  of  her  most  prominent  characteristics. 
The  pleasure  she  enjoyed  in  their  society  was  fully  counterpoised  by  that 
she  imparted.  To  them  she  was  never  lofty,  nor  reserved,  nor  mystical ; 
for  no  one  had  ever  a  more  perfect  faculty  for  entering  into  their  sportsj 
their  feelings,  their  enjoyments.  She  could  narrate  almost  any  story  in 


'  'xflii,Li2R  ITU 

«%;.guage  Irvel  to  their  capacities,  and  in  a  manner  calculated  to  l>  TIK-  •.'* 
'licir  hearty  and  often  boisteroasly-expresseJl  delight.  She  possesoed  iLp.r- 
cllou3  powers  of  observation  and  imitation  or  mimicry;  and,  hac  ihe 
)een  attracted  to  the  stage,  would  have  been  the  first  actress  America  hi.1 
-)  oduced,  whether  in  tragedy  or  comedy.  Her  faculty  of  mimicking  ^aa 
r  Vi  needed  to  con  mend  her  to  the  herrts  of  children,  but  it  had  its  efTect 
i  increasing  the  fascinations  of  her  genial  nature  and  her  heartfelt  j  v 
i  their  society.  To  amuse  and  instruct  them  was  an  achievement  fo/ 
^  hich  she  would  readily  forego  any  personal  object;  and  ner  intuitive 
perception  rf  the  toys,  games,  stories,  rhymes,  etc.,  best  adapted  to  arrest 
a  -d  enchain  their  attention,  was  unsurpassed.  Between  her  and  my  o  ly 
child,  then  living,  who  was  eight  months  old  when  she  came  to  us,  nml 
something  over  two  years  when  she  sailed  for  Europe,  tendrils  of  affect! o.i 
gradually  intefwimd  themselves,  which  I  trust  Death  has  not  severed  tu: 
rather  multiplied  and  strengthened.  She  became  his  teacher,  pi ayroite, 
and  monitor;  and  he  requited  her  with  a  prodigality  01  lovt  unl 
admiration. 

"  I  shall  not  soon  forget  their  meeting  in  my  office,  after  some  weeirj 
separation,  just  before  she  left  us  forever.  His  mother  had  brought  him 
in  from  the  country,  and  left  him  asleep  on  my  sofa,  while  she  was  abten'- 
making  purchases,  and  he  had  rolled  off  and  hurt  himself  in  tLe  allv 
waking  with  the  shock  in  a  frenzy  of  anger,  just  before  Margaret,  hcuin^ 
of  his  arrival,  rushed  into  the  office  to  find  him.  I  was  vainly  attempting 
to  soothe  him  as  she  entered;  but  he  was  running  from  one  end  to  the 
other  of  the  office,  crying  passionately,  and  refusing  to  be  pacified.  Sho 
hastened  to  him,  in  perfect  confidence  that  her  endearments  would  cab  . 
the  current  of  his  feelings,  —  that  the  sound  of  her  well-remembered  voii. 
would  banish  all  thought  of  his  pain,  —  and  that  another  moment  wo;:..' 
see  him  restored  to  gentleness;  but,  half-wakened,  he  did  not  heed  *  cr, 
and  probably  did  not  even  realize  who  it  was  that  caught  him  repeatedly 
in  her  arms  and  tenderly  insisted  that  he  should  restrain  himseli.  A_t  Isst 
she  desisted  in  despair;  and,  with  the  bitter  tears  streaming  down  her 
face,  observed :  — '  Pickie,  many  friends  have  treated  me  unkindly,  but  no 
one  had  ever  the  power  to  cut  me  to  the  heart  as  you  have !'  Being  thus 
let  alone,  he  soon  came  to  himself,  and  their  mutual  delight  in  the  meeting 
was  rather  heightened  by  the  momentary  estrangement. 

"They  had  one  more  meeting;  the  last  on  earth!  'Aunty  Margaret1 
was  to  embark  for  Europe  on  a  certain  day,  and  '  Pickie '  was  brought 
into  the  city  to  bid  her  farewell.  They  met  this  time  also  at  my  office, 
and  together  we  thence  repaired  to  the  ferry-boat,  on  which  she  was 
returning  to  her  residence  in  Brooklyn  to  complete  her  preparations  for 
the  voyage.  There  they  took  a  tender  and  affecting  leave  of  eacn  othe  . 
But  soon  his  mother  called  at  the  office,  on  her  way  to  the  departing  t^i"  , 
and  we  were  easily  persuaded  to  accompany  her  th'tL  ,r,  and  say  fareT'd\ 
once  more,  to  the  manifest  satisfaction  of  both  Margiret  and  the  young •  z 
of  her  devoted  friends.  Thus  they  parted,  never  t.  :ieet  again  in  time. 
She  sent  him  messages  and  presents  repeatedly  froiu  Europe;  and  he, 


^iti  UiTR  OF  HOR'_>J  GEEELEY 

v/Le.:  rdaevrhat  older,  dic*,atod  a  letter  in  return,  which  was  joyful! ' 
r'jeived  and  acknowledged.  When  th0,  nioiner  of  our  great-soultd  frienc 
sp  ~d  some  days  with  us  nearly  two  years  afterward,  '  Pickie '  talked  to  hei 
often  and  lovingly  of  'Aunty  Margaret,'  proposing  that  they  two  shoul. 
'  ^ake  a  boat  and  go  over  and  see  her,'  —  for,  to  his  infantile  conception 
the  low  coast  of  Long  Island,  visible  just  across  the  Fist  River,  was  that 
Europe  to  which  she  had  sailed,  and  where  she  was  unaccountabl  • 
detained  &">  long.  Alas!  a  far  longer  and  more  adventurous  journey  was 
required  to  re-unite  those  loving  souls!  The  12th  of  July,  184C,  saw  hi> « 
st-icken  down  from  health  to  death,  by  the  relentless  cholera;  and  nry 
leMer,  anmuncing  that  calamity,  drew  from  her  a  burst  of  pajsion-  & 
sorrow,  sucL  as  hardly  any  bereavement  but  the  loss  of  a  very  near  relative 
;.»'ild  have  impelled.  Another  year  had  just  ended,  wh?n  a  calamity, 

•  quslly  sudden,  bereft  a  wide  circle  of  her  likewise,  with  her  husband  and 
ii.fant  sor.    Little  did  I  fear,  when  I  bade  her  a  confident  Good-by,  on  the 
deck  of  her  outward-bound  ship,  that  the  sea  would  close  over  her  earthly 
remains  ere  we  should  meet  again;  far  less  that  the  light  of  my  eyes  and 
'he  cynosure  of  my  hopes,  who  then  bade  her  a  tenderer  and  sadder  fare- 
well, would  precede  her  on  the  dim  pathway  to  that  'Father's  house' 
whence  is  no  returning!    Ah,  well!  God  is  above  all,  and  gracious  alike 
in  .yhat  He  conceals  and  what  He  discloses ;  —  benignant  and  bounteous, 
•.a  well  ivhen  H3  reclaims  as  when  He  bestows.  In  a  few  years,  at  farthest, 
our  loved  and  lost  ones  will  welcome  us  to  their  home." 

At  a  later  period  of  his  life,  Mr.  Greeley  spoke  of  this  great 
/oman  with  even  warmer  enthusiasm  and  higher  admiration, 
ve  said: 

"Ve  have  seen  that  the  first  impressions  made  by  Margaret,  even  on  those 

•  /ho  so"n  learned  to  admire  her  most,  were  not  favourable ;  and  it  was 
decidedly  so  in  my  case.    A  sufferer  myself,  and  at  times  scarcely  able  to 
ride  to  and  from  the  office,  I  yet  did  a  day's  work  each  day,  regardless  of 
nerves  or  moods ;  but  she  had  no  such  capacity  for  incessant  labour.    If 

'  quantity  only  ,were  considered,  I  could  easily  write  ten  columns  to  her 
one :  indeed,  she  would  only  write  at  all  when  in  the  vein ;  and  her  head- 
aches and  other  infirmities  often  precluded  all  labour  for  days.  Meantime, 
perhaps,  the  interest  of  the  theme  had  evaporated,  or  the  book  to  be 
reviewed  had  the  bloom  brushed  from  its  cheek  by  some  rival  journal. 
Attendance  and  care  were  very  needful  to  her;  she  would  evidently  have 
been  \appier  amid  other  and  more  abundant  furniture  than  graced  rur 
dwelling;  and,  while  nothing  was  said,  I  felt  that  a  richer  and  more  gen- 
trois  diet  than  ours  would  have  been  more  accordant  with  her  tastes  and 
vistes.  Then  I  had  a  notion  that  strong-minded  women  should  be  above 
'•Jv..  rreaknesc  of  fe_ring  to  go  anywhere,  at  any  time,  alone,  —  that  the  sex 
•>ould  1  ave  to  emauoipate  itself  from  thraldom  to  etiquette  and  the  need 
of  a  masculine  an  in  crossing  a  street  or  a  room,  before  it  could  expect 
to  fight  its  way  to  the  l.ar,  the  bench,  the  jury-box,  and  the  polls.  Nor 


MARGARET   FULLER.  177 

was  I  wholly  exempt  from  the  vulgar  prejudice  against  female  claimants 
of  functions  hitherto  devolved  only  on  men,  as  mistaking  the  source  of 
their  dissatisfaction.  Her  cousin,  Channing,  narrating  a  day's  conversa- 
tion with  her  in  1840,  delicately  says: — 

"  But  the  tragedy  of  Margaret's  history  was  deeper  yet.  Behind  the  poet  was  tho 
woman,  —  the  fond  and  relying,  the  heroic  and  disinterested  woman.  The  very  glow  of 
her  poetic  enthusiasm  was  but  an  outfltish  of  trustful  allection;  the  very  restlessness 
of  her  intellect  was  the  confession  that  her  heart  had  found  no  home.  A  'book-worm,1  a 


'dilettante,' a  '  pedant,' I  had  heard  her  sneenngly  called;  b 
her  geemirg  insensibility  was  virgin  pride,  and  her  absorj-.tisji 
of  emotions  which  had  met  no  object  worthy  of  life-long  attucl 
her  peculiarities  became  intelligible.  Fitfulness,  unlooked-for 
ceptions  of  words  and  actions,  substitution  of  fancy  for  fact 
during  the  previous  season,  as  inconsistent  in  a  person  of  BUC! 


it  now  it  was  evident  that 

iu  study  the  natural  vent 

ment.    At  once,  many  of 

changes  of  mood,  miscon- 

—  which  had  annoyed  me 

capacious  judgment  and 


sustained  self-government,  — were  now  referred  to  the  morbid  inllueiice  of  affections  pent 
up  to  prey  upon  themselves." 

If  /  had  attempted  to  say  this,  I  should  have  somehow  blundered  out 
that,  noble  and  great  as  she  was,  a  good  husband  and  two  or  three 
bouncing  babies  would  have  emancipated  her  from  a  deal  of  cant  and 
nonsense. 

Yet  I  very  soon  noted,  even  before  I  was  prepared  to  ratify  their  judg- 
ment, that  the  women  who  visited  us  to  make  or  improve  her  acquaintance 
seemed  instinctively  to  recognize  and  defer  to  her  as  their  superior  in 
thought  and  culture.  Some  who  were  her  seniors,  and  whose  writings  had 
achieved  a  far  wider  and  more  profitable  popularity  than  hers,  were  eager 
to  sit  at  her  feet,  and  to  listen  to  her  casual  utterances  as  to  those  of  an 
oracle.  Yet  there  was  no  assumption  of  precedence,  no  exaction  of  defer- 
ence, on  her  part ;  for,  though  somewhat  stately  and  reserved  in  the  pres- 
ence of  strangers,  no  one  "  thawed  out "  more  completely,  or  was  more 
unstarched  and  cordial  in  manner,  when  surrounded  by  her  friends.  Her 
magnetic  sway  over  these  was  marvellous,  unaccountable:  women  who 
had  known  her  but  a  day  revealed  to  her  the  most  jealously  guarded  secrets 
of  their  lives,  seeking  her  sympathy  and  counsel  thereon,  and  were  them- 
selves annoyed  at  having  done  so  when  the  magnetism  of  her  presence  was 
withdrawn.  I  judge  that  she  was  the  repository  of  more  confidences  than 
any  cotemporary ;  and  I  am  sure  no  one  had  ever  reason  to  regret  the  im- 
prudent precipitancy  of  their  trust.  Nor  were  these  revelations  made  by 
those  only  of  her  own  plane  of  life,  but  chambermaids  and  seamstresses 
unburdened  their  souls  to  her,  seeking  and  receiving  her  counsel ;  while 
children  found  her  a  delightful  playmate  and  a  capital  friend.  My  son 
Arthur  (otherwise  "  Pickie  "),  who  was  but  eight  months  old  when  she 
came  to  us,  learned  to  walk  and  to  talk  in  her  society,  and  to  love  and 
admire  her  as  few  but  nearest  relatives  are  ever  loved  and  admired  by  a 
child.  For,  as  the  elephant's  trunk  serves  either  to  rend  a  limb  from  the 
oak  or  pick  up  a  pin,  so  her  wonderful  range  of  capacities,  of  experiences, 
of  sympathies,  seemed  adapted  to  every  condition  and  phase  of  humanity. 
For  every  effort  to  limit  vice,  ignorance,  and  misery,  she  had  a  ready,  eager 
ear,  and  a  willing  hand ;  so  that  her  charities — large  in  proportion  to  her 
12 


LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

slender  means — were  signally  enhanced  by  the  fitness  and  fulness  of  her 
wise  and  generous  counsel,  the  readiness  and  emphasis  with  which  she,  pub- 
licly and  privately,  commended  to  those  richer  than  herself  any  object  de- 
serving their  alms.  She  had  once  attended,  with  other  noble  women,  a 
gathering  of  outcasts  of  their  sex ;  and,  being  asked  how  they  appeared 
to  her,  replied,  "As  women  like  myself,  save  that  they  are  victims  of 
wrong  and  misfortune."  No  project  of  moral  or  social  reform  ever  failed 
to  command  her  generous,  cheering  benediction,  even  when  she  could  not 
share  the  sanguine  hopes  of  its  authors :  she  trusted  that  these  might 
somehow  benefit  the  objects  of  their  self-sacrifice,  and  felt  confident  that 
they  must,  at  all  events,  be  blest  in  their  own  moral  natures.  I  doubt  that 
our  various  benevolent  and  reformatory  associations  had  ever  before,  or 
have  ever  since,  received  such  wise,  discriminating  commendation  to  the 
favour  of  the  rich,  as  they  did  from  her  pen  during  her  connection  with 
The  Tribune. 

In  closing  her  "Woman  in  the  Nineteenth  Century,"  not  long  before  she 
came  to  New- York,  she  had  said :  — 

"I  stand  in  the  sunny  noon  of  life.  Objects  no  longer  glitter  in  the  dews  of  morning, 
neither  are  they  yet  softened  by  the  shadows  of  evening.  Every  spot  is  seen,  every 
chasm  revealed.  Climbing  the  dusty  hill,  some  few  effigies,  that  once  stood  for  symbols 
of  human  destiny,  have  been  broken ;  those  I  still  have  with  me  show  defects  in  this 
broad  light.  Yet  enough  is  left,  even  by  experience,  to  point  distinctly  to  the  glories  of 
that  destiny,— faint,  but  not  to  be  mistaken,  streaks  of  the  future  day.  I  can  say  with 
the  bard, — 

•Though  MAWY  have  suffered  shipwreck,  still  beat  noble  hearts.' " 

Though  ten  years  had  not  passed  since  her  first  visit  to  Emerson,  at 
Concord,  so  graphically  narrated  by  him  in  a  reminiscence  wherefrom  I 
have  already  quoted,  care  and  suffering  had  meantime  detracted  much 
from  the  lightness  of  her  step,  the  buoyancy  of  her  spirits.  If,  in  any  of 
her  varying  moods,  she  was  so  gay-hearted  and  mirth-provoking  as  he 
there  describes  her,  I  never  happened  to  be  a  witness;  but  then  I  was 
never  so  intimate  and  admired  a  friend  as  he  became  at  an  early  day,  and 
remained  to  the  last.  Satirical  she  could  still  be,  on  great  provocation ; 
but  she  rarely,  and,  I  judge,  reluctantly,  gave  evidence  of  her  eminent 
power  to  rebuke  assumption  or  meanness  by  caricaturing  or  intensifying 
their  unconscious  exhibition.  She  could  be  joyous,  and  even  merry;  but 
her  usual  manner,  while  with  us,  was  one  of  grave  thoughtfulness,  absorp- 
tion in  noble  deeds,  and  in  paramount  aspirations  and  efforts  to  leave 
some  narrow  corner  of  the  world  somewhat  better  than  she  had  found  it.  * 

While  Margaret  Fuller  was  one  of  the  editors  of  The  Tri- 
bune, she  wrote  several  articles — from  two  to  five — each  week. 
On  account  of  ill  health,  she  could  only  write  when  "  in  the 
mood,"  the  mood  sometimes  declining  to  come  at  her  bidding. 

1  Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life,  177-81. 


FEMALE  JOURNALISTS.  179 

Her  literary  reviews  were  rather  disquisitions  upon  the  authors 
of  books  than-  criticisms  upon  the  works  themselves.  It  was 
she,  and  in  articles  in  The  Tribune,  who  first  taught  Americans 
to  appreciate  and  to  love  George  Sand.  "  With  a  bleeding 
heart  and  bewildered  feet,"  said  the  American  woman  of  her 
sister  in  France,  "  she  sought  the  Truth,  and  if  she  lost  the 
way,  returned  as  soon  as  convinced  she  had  done  so,  but  she 
would  never  hide  the  fact  that  she  had  lost  it.  'What  God 
knows  I  dare  avow  to  man,'  seems  to  be  her  motto."  If  there 
are  thousands  in  our  land  at  this  hour  who  cannot  think  of 
George  Sand  but  with  tears,  and  reverence,  and  love,  they  may 
bless  Margaret  Fuller  for  the  delicious  sadness.  But  for 
Margaret,  the  genius  of  George  Sand  might  with  us  be  even 
yet  trampled  under  the  feet  of  men.  The  literary  columns  of 
The  Tribune  at  this  time  also  bore  generous  testimony  to  the 
genius  of  Carlyle,  Longfellow,  Eichter,  Eugene  Sue,  and  others, 
and  gave  new  charm  and  fascination  to  the  grand  old  masters 
of  English  literature.  Margaret  Fuller  also  contributed  essays 
of  a  general  character  to  The  Tribune,  which  were  remarkable 
for  freshness,  suggestiveness,  and  wisdom.  Among  them,  as 
one  might  well  conclude  from  what  we  have  seen  Mr.  Greeley 
has  said  of  her,  and  from  what  ought  to  be  generally  known 
of  her  works,  were  articles  upon  Woman's  Eights.  He  was 
surely  correct  in  saying  that  her  "  Woman  in  the  Nineteenth 
Century  "  if  not  the  clearest  and  most  logical  was  the  loftiest 
and  most  commanding  assertion  that  had  been  made  of  the 
right  of  Woman  to  be  regarded  and  treated  as  an  independent, 
intelligent,  rational  being,  entitled  to  an  equal  voice  in  framing 
and  modifying  the  laws  she  is  required  to  obey,  and  in  con 
trolling  and  disposing  of  the  property  she  has  inherited  or 
aided  to  acquire.  He  was  confident  there  lived  neither  man 
nor  woman  who  might  not  profit  by  a  thoughtful  perusal  of 
that  work. 

I  have  judged  it  just  thus  to  speak  and  quote  at  such  length 
of  Margaret  Fuller,  not  only  because  Mr.  Greeley's  acquaint- 
ance with  her  made  the  finest  epic  poem  of  his  life,  but  because 
she  was  the  pioneer  of  American  female  journalists.  She  did 
not  succeed  in  persuading  her  country  that  Woman  ought  to 


180  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GKEELEY. 

be  treated  as  an  independent,  intelligent,  rational  being,  to  be 
so  acknowledged  by  the  laws;  but  by  her  own  life  she  demon- 
strated the  truth  of  her  claim,  and  set  an  example  which  has 
been  followed  by  many  women  who  have  added  power  and 
great  beneficence  to  the  most  influential  of  professions. 

Many  of  our  great  journals  now  have  female  editors  and 
correspondents  who  receive  equal  pay  and  equal  honour  with 
men  in  similar  positions.  Miss  Kate  Field  won  deserved  dis- 
tinction as  a  writer  on  The  Tribune,  and  even  greater  reputation 
on  the  platform.  "  Fanny  Fern  "  became  the  first  of  literary 
sensationalists.  No  "Washington  correspondent  has  more 
grandly  succeeded  than  Mary  Clemner  Ames.  Grace  Green- 
wood, in  journalism,  has  had  vastly  more  readers  than  she  ever 
procured  as  a  writer  of  books,  piquant,  genial,  irreverent  as 
she  was,  even  when,  between  solemn  green  bindings,  she 
declared  that  a  certain  dilapidated  mill  property  was  not  worth 
a  dam.  Mrs.  Emily  E.  Briggs  ("Olivia")  has  made  a  wide 
reputation  and  a  good  deal  of  money,  besides  accomplishing  a 
great  amount  of  good,  on  Forney's  Philadelphia  Press.  No 
representative  of  a  metropolitan  journal  at  the  National  Capital 
is  more  industrious,  more  pains-taking,  than  she,  not  one  who 
gets  hold  of  better  news,  and  not  one  wrho  equals  her  in  inde- 
pendence and  originality.  The  literary  department  of  The 
Chicago  Evening  Post  has  been  noted  for  its  impartial  criti- 
cisms, their  elevated  tone,  and  delicate  appreciation  of  genius, 
learning,  art.  This  department  of  that  journal  has  for  years 
been  conducted  by  Mrs.  Sara  M.  Hubbard.  One  of  the 
associate  editors  of  the  paper  is  Miss  Buchanan,  a  lady  of  real 
genius,  who  can  dash  off  a  leader  on  almost  any  topic  in  the 
most  lively  and  readable  style.  Celia  Logan  has  not  only 
contributed  essays  to  several  of  our  magazines,  but  was  for 
some  time  assistant  editor  of  a  Washington  journal  which  has 
never  been  so  excellent  since  she  departed  from  it.  Her  less 
brilliant  but  more  successful  sister,  Olive,  has  been  a  frequent 
contributor  to  The  Tribune. 

Very  many  other  instances  might  be  given.  These  show  that 
the  example  set  by  Margaret  Fuller  was  not  in  vain.  If  she 
did  not  so  happily  succeed  in  persuading  the  public  of  the 


CHARLES   DICKENS.  181 

correctness  of  her  views  of  Woman's  Eights,  it  may  have  been 
because  of  the  unfortunate  fact  that  too  many  of  those  who 
espoused  the  cause  were  selfish,  croakers,  ill  educated,  coarse, 
and  vituperative.  She  at  last  succeeded  in  giving  Woman  an 
honourable,  most  influential  position  in  journalism,  whence  in 
good  time  Woman  may  safely  demand  the  rights  for  which 
she  has  long  begged  in  vain;  which,  it  would  seem  probable, 
she  would  have  had  much  more  generally  recognized  ere  this 
time  but  that  the  management  of  the  cause  was  iisurped  by 
women,  the  preposterous  scoldings  of  some  and  the  atrocious 
principles  of  others  of  whom  made  that  cause  appear,  first 
highly  ridiculous  and  then  surpassingly  immoral.  These 
excesses  had  not  occurred  but  for  the  untimely  death  of  Mar- 
garet Fuller.  Her  commanding  genius  and  her  rich  wisdom 
would  have  prevented  any  cause  she  advocated  and  led  from 
being  regarded  by  many  as  either  ridiculous  or  wrong. 

Horace  Greeley  was  among  the  first  of  American  journalists 
to  recognize  the  genius  of  Charles  Dickens.  In  the  very  first 
number  of  The  New-Yorker,  he  published  a  story  by  "  Boz," 
a  nom  de  plume  then  unknown  in  America,  and  but  just 
struggling  into  notice  in  England.  Upon  the  occasion  of  Mr. 
Dickens's  first  visit  to  America,  The  Tribune  did  not  so 
heartily  approve  the  dinners  in  his  honour  as  his  advocacy  of 
an  international  law  of  copyright.  In  reply  to  certain  com- 
plaints of  the  novelist's  advocacy  of  such  a  measure  Mr. 
Greeley  said: 

"We  trust  lie  will  not  be  deterred  from  speaking  the  frank,  round  truth 
by  any  mistaken  courtesy,  diffidence,  or  misapprehension  of  public  senti- 
ment. He  ought  to  speak  out  on  this  matter,  for  who  shall  protest  against 
robbery  if  those  who  are  robbed  may  not?  Here  is  a  man  who  writes  for 
a  living  and  writes  nobly;  and  we  of  this  country  greedily  devour  his 
writings,  are  entertained  and  instructed  by  them,  yet  refuse  so  to  protect 
his  rights  as  an  author  that  he  can  realize  a  single  dollar  from  all  their 
vast  American  sale  and  popularity.  Is  this  right?  Do  we  look  well  offer- 
ing him  toasts,  compliments,  and  other  syllabub,  while  we  refuse  him 
naked  justice?  while  we  say  that  every  man  may  take  from  him  the  fruits 
of  his  labours  without  recompense  or  redress  ?  It  does  very  well  in  a  dinner 
speech  to  say  that  fame  and  popularity,  and  all  that,  are  more  than  sordid 
gold;  but  he  has  a  wife  and  four  children,  whom  his  death  may  very  pos- 
sibly leave  destitute,  perhaps  dependent  for  their  bread,  while  publishers, 


182  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GKEELEY. 

who  have  grown  rich  on  his  writings,  roll  by  in  their  carriages,  anl  mil- 
lions  who  have  been  instructed  by  them  contribute  not  one  farthing  to 
their  comfort.  But  suppose  him  rich,  if  you  please,  the  justice  of  the  case 
is  unaltered.  He  is  the  just  owner  of  his  own  productions  as  much  as 
though  he  had  made  axes  or  horse-shoes ;  and  the  people  who  refuse  to 
protect  his  right,  ought  not  to  insult  him  with  the  mockery  of  thriftless 
praise.  Let  us  be  just,  and  then  generous.  Good  reader!  if  you  think  our 
guest  ought  to  be  enabled  to  live  by  and  enjoy  the  fruits  of  his  talents  and 
toil,  just  put  your  names  to  a  petition  for  an  International  Copyright  Law, 
and  then  you  can  take  his  hand  heartily  if  it  comes  in  your  way,  and  say, 
if  need  be,  '  I  have  done  what  is  in  my  power  to  protect  you  from  robbery ! ' 
The  passage  of  this  act  of  long  deferred  justice  will  be  a  greater  tribute  to 
his  worth  and  achievements  than  acres  of  inflated  compliments  soaked  in 
hogsheads  of  champagne." 

Washington  Irving  was  chosen  to  preside  at  the  Dickens 
Dinner  in  New- York.  With  great  genius  were  connected  in 
his  nature  the  tenderness  and  the  modesty  of  woman.  He 
dreaded  the  dinner-speech.  "  I  know,"  he  said,  "  I  shall  break 
down."  When  the  time  came  for  him  to  welcome  the  distin- 
guished guest  he  began  an  appropriate  speech  which  he  had 
prepared  in  excellent  manner,  and  the  profound  respect  and 
love  in  which  he  was  held  caused  the  deepest  attention  and 
perfect  silence  except  the  sound  of  his  own  voice.  This  and 
the  up-turned  faces  frightened  him,  and  after  two  or  three 
sentences  he  sat  down,  blushing  like  a  maiden  and  completely 
embarrassed.  "There!"  said  he,  after  he  had  recovered  his 
presence  of  mind  enough  to  speak  to  the  gentleman  sitting 
next  to  him,  "  I  told  you  I  would  break  down ;  and  I  have  done 
it."  There  never  was  a  failure  so  entirely  successful  as  this. 
It  could  hardly  have  been  the  beloved  writer  if  he  had  not 
"  broken  down." 

The  Tribune  defended  Mr.  Dickens  against  the  attacks  made 
upon  him  by  reason  of  certain  criticisms  of  his  upon  American 
character  and  customs  in  his  "  American  Notes  "  and  the  novel 
of  "Martin  Chuzzlewit."  It  may  not  be  generally  known  that 
the  "Eden "  of  the  work  last  named  is  the  town  of  Cairo,  in 
Illinois,  where  Mr.  Dickens  made  an  investment  in  town  lots, 
which,  as  he  refused  to  play  the  popular  American  game  of 
"  diamond  cut  diamond,"  never  returned  him  any  dividends. 


TOE   DICKENS   DINNER.  183 

Justice  to  Cairo  demands  the  statement  that  Mr.  Dickens's 
"Eden"  is  in  some  degree  imaginary. 

I  may  be  excused,  I  trust,  for  taking  the  liberty, — of  which 
Mr.  Dickens  set  many  examples, — of  here  speaking  of  his 
reception  in  New- York  on  his  second  visit  to  America  in  1868. 
The  Dickens  Dinner  at  Delmonico's  on  the  18th  of  April  was 
surely  one  of  the  finest  occasions  of  the  kind  which  even  Del- 
monico  has  witnessed.  The  dinner  was  given  by  the  Press 
Club  of  the  city.  Horace  Greeley  presided.  There  were  many 
distinguished  men,  journalists,  artists,  writers,  present.  There 
sat  Henry  J.  Raymond,  to  whom  years  of  experience  as  jour- 
nalist and  public  man  had  given  reputation,  wisdom,  and  the 
happiest  social  manners.  Near  by  was  George  William  Curtis, 
with  a  face  sicklied  o'er  with  the  pale  cast  of  thought,  who,  like 
.Raymond,  was  one  of  the  few  Americans  excelling  both  as 
speakers  and  as  writers.  There  too  was  Mr.  Whitelaw  Reid, 
looking  younger  than  he  was,  destined  to  be  Mr.  Greeley's 
successor  as  Editor  of  The  Tribune,  and  to  bear  up  its  lofty 
character  without  a  day  of  drooping  hesitation.  Murat  Hal- 
stead,  of  the  West,  was  there,  and  near  him  was  Samuel  Bowles 
of  the  most  widely  influential  journal  of  New  England.  Gen- 
eral Joseph  R.  Hawley,  soldier,  statesman,  editor,  and  great  in 
each  capacity,  made  one  of  the  most  notable  of  the  speeches. 
Mr.  James  Parton,  the  biographer  of  Franklin,  of  Jackson,  and 
of  Greeley,  on  this  occasion  represented  The  North  American 
He  view.  There  also  was  Augustus  Maverick,  soon  to  become 
the  biographer  of  Mr.  liaymond,  whose  untimely  death  occurred 
only  a  little  more  than  a  year  afterwards.  The  World  news- 
paper was  represented  by  Mr.  D.  G.  Croly,  Mr.  F.  B.  Carpenter, 
and  Mr.  Henry  E.  Sweetser.  Mr.  Thomas  McElrath,  long  Mr. 
Greeley's  partner,  Mr.  Samuel  Sinclair,  for  years  the  business 
manager  of  The  Tribune,  Mr.  J.  Russell  Young,  managing 
editor,  Mr.  R.  G.  Hassard,  associate  editor,  and  Mr.  F.  J. 
Ottarson,  city  editor,  and  Mr.  J.  F.  Cleveland,  associate 
editor,  and  compiler  of  The  Tribune  Almanac  participated 
in  the  proceedings.  Mr.  Charles  Nordhoflf,  of  The  Evening 
Post,  one  of  our  most  accomplished  journalists,  was  present. 
There  too  were  editors  of  religious  journals,  of  magazines. 


18-1  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELET. 

and  representatives  of  great  publishing  houses.  There  also 
was  Mr.  "William  Orton,  who  spoiled  a  great  editor  when 
lie  made  himself  the  head  of  a  great  telegraph  company. 
Others  there  were  less  or  more  distinguished  in  journal- 
ism, in  letters,  in  commerce  than  some  of  those  here  named. 
To  preside  over  an  assemblage  of  such  men,  with  Charles 
Dickens  for  their  guest,  was  an  honour  which  Mr.  Greeley 
highly  prized,  and  which  he  justly  deserved.  The  auto- 
biographical portion  of  his  speech  follows: 

It  is  now  a  little  more  than  thirty-four  years  since  I,  a  young  printer, 
recently  located  in  the  city  of  New- York,  had  the  audacity  to  undertake 
the  editing  and  publishing  a  weekly  newspaper  for  the  first  time.  Look- 
mg  around  at  that  day  for  materials  with  which  to  make  an  engaging 
appearance  before  the  public,  among  the  London  magazines  which  I  pur- 
chased  for  the  occasion  was  the  old  Monthly,  containing  a  story  by  a  then 
unknown  writer — known  to  us  only  by  the  quaint  designation  of  "  Boz." 
That  story,  entitled,  I  think,  at  that  time,  "  Delicate  Attentions,"  but  in  its 
present  form  entitled,  "  Mr.  Watkins  Tottle,"  I  selected  and  published  in 
the  first  number  of  the  first  journal  with  which  my  name  was  connected. 
Pickwick  was  then  an  unchronicled,  if  not  uncreated  character.  Sam 
Weller  had  not  yet  arisen  to  increase  the  mirth  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  race. 
We  had  not  heard,  as  we  have  since  heard,  of  the  writer  of  those  sketches, 
whose  career  then  I  may  claim  to  have  in  some  sort  commenced  with  my 
own  [great  laughter],  and  the  relation  of  admirer  and  admired  has  con- 
tinued from  that  day  to  the  present.  I  am  one  of  not  more  than  twenty 
of  the  present  company  who  welcomed  him  in  this  country,  on  an  occa- 
sion much  like  this,  a  quarter  of  a  century  ago.  When  I  came  to  visit 
Europe,  now  seventeen  years  ago,  one  of  my  most  pleasant  experiences 
there,  and  one  of  my  pleasantest  recollections  of  Europe,  is  that  of  buying 
in  the  farthest  city  I  visited — the  city  of  Venice,  on  the  Adriatic — an  Ital- 
ian newspaper,  and  amusing  myself  with  what  I  could  not  read — a  trans- 
lation of  "  David  Copperfield,"  wherein  the  dialogue  between  Ham  and 
Peggotty,  with  which  I  was  familiar  in  English,  was  rendered  into  very 
amusing  Italian.  *  *  *  *  Friends  and  fellow-labourers,  as  I  am  to 
set  you  an  example  to-night  of  a  short  speech,  I  will,  without  further  pre- 
lude, ask  you  to  join  me  in  this  sentiment:  "Health  and  happiness, 
honour  and  generous,  because  just,  recompense  to  our  friend  and  guest, 
Charles  Dickens." 

Mr.  Dickens  responded  as  he  only  could  respond  to  a  toast. 
Mr.  Greeley  gracefully  called  out  Mr.  Raymond  to  respond  in 
behalf  of  the  New- York  Press.  Mr.  Curtis  spoke  of  The 
Weekly  Press  in  happiest  manner.  General  Hawley  responded 


THE  TRIBUNE  IN   CRITICISM.  185 

to  The  Press  of  New  England.  Others  spoke,  and  all  things 
moved  on  in  a  manner  that  was  worthy  of  the  Working  jour- 
nalists of  New- York  and  the  most  widely-read  novelist  of  his 
times. 

"How  happily  the  days 
Of  Thalaba  went  by!" 

"Certainly  the  occasion  of  the  Dickens  Dinner  in  New- York 
was  one  of  the  bright,  glorious  field-days  of  Horace  Greeley's 
life. 

Let  us  return.  The  Tribune  not  only  aided  in  giving  the 
Transcendentalists  the  influence  and  popularity  to  which  the 
most  thoughtful  minds  of  the  country  were  entitled,  but  it 
held  out  a  generous  hand  of  welcome  and  of  help  to  every 
struggling  thought.  There  came  a  time  when  still  a  new 
school  of  thinkers  occupied  prominent  position  in  the  literary 
world, — thinkers  who  undertook  to  advance  the  cause  of  truth 
through  the  demonstrations  of  science.  Proclaiming  that 
skepticism  is  a  nobler  intellectual  quality  than  credulity,  and 
that  no  authority  can  establish  an  absurdity  or  overthrow  that 
which  is  true,  they  were  condemned  unheard  by  many  as 
enemies  of  religion,  and,  consequently,  as  assailants  of  the 
highest  civilization.  Among  the  class  of  thinkers  to  whom 
we  refer  were  a  number  of  the  most  subtle  and  comprehensive 
minds.  Now,  it  is  confessed,  they  have  done  much  for  scholar- 
ship, for  science,  for  truth;  and  their  influence  has  been  such 
that'  the  religion  they  were  supposed  to  assail  has  become 
more  liberal,  more  beautiful,  and  more  beneficent  in  the  judg- 
ment of  those  whose  opinions  are  most  entitled  to  respect. 
We  are  apt  to  forget  that  it  required  not  only  wisdom  but 
courage  for  criticism  to  recognize  and  honour  even  Ralph 
Waldo  Emerson,  Margaret  Fuller,  and  George  Eipley;  that 
so  it  was  also  with  George  Sand,  and  later  with  Huxley,  Her- 
bert Spenser,  Darwin,  and  others  whom  mere  authority  sought 
to  put  down. 

It  will  not  be  supposed,  of  course,  that  Mr.  Greeley  person- 
ally wrote  the  literary  articles  of  The  Tribune  which,  in  the 
manner  we  have  pointed  out,  accomplished  BO  much  for  litera- 


186  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

ture,  at  the  same  time  enlarging  its  influence  and  power,  and 
the  influence  and  power  of  the  public  press.  He  chose  his 
literary  as  his  other  assistants,  however,  with  the  object  of 
having  his  views  promulgated  in  this  as  in  other  departments 
of  the  journal ;  and  The  Tribune  had  not  been  long  established 
until  both  George  Ripley  and  Margaret  Fuller  were  of  the 
corps.  Those  were  the  literary  lieutenants  he  wanted;  and 
he  procured  their  services. 

If  it  be  proper  to  generalize  here,  it  might  be  remarked  that 
the  literary  history  of  The  New- York  Tribune  is  one  of  the 
most  palpable  demonstrations  of  Horace  Greeley's  many-sided 
genius.  Consider  that  he  had  never  had  an  academical  course 
of  education.  With  the  exception  of  almost  the  slightest 
possible  aid  from  common  schools  during  early  boyhood,  his 
intellectual  training  had  been  all  his  own.  He  had  acquired 
no  language  except  that  in  which  his  fathers  spoke,  and  with 
that  he  seems  ever  to  have  been  content.  And  yet  there  was 
no  one  scholar  among  his  countrymen,  no  matter  how  pro- 
foundly versed  in  learning,  who  accomplished  so  much  for  lite- 
rature, or  who  gave  it  so  just,  comprehensive,  wise  an  appreci- 
ation, as  a  means  of  human  progress  and  of  general  enlighten- 
ment. There  were  those  whose  views  in  respect  to  the  mode 
of  thorough  education  may  have  been  more  correct  than  his, 
but  none  who  approached  him  in  giving  what  may  be  called 
general  intellectual  culture  to  the  general  public. 

The  notable  fact  of  which  I  have  just  spoken  is  a  demonstra- 
tion not  only  of  Mr.  Greeley's  many-sided  genius,  but  also  of 
his  democratic  nature.  One  of  the  people,  he  sought  those 
means  by  which  the  people  could  be  most  benefitted,  and, 
what  with  his  great  genius  and  his  democratic  nature,  he 
found  means,  through  literary  influences,  to  confer  at  once  the 
greatest  practicable  good  upon  the  people  and  upon  literature. 
I  think  I  am  correct  in  the  judgment  that  no  literary  man  has 
conferred  greater  or  more  permanent  good  upon  literature  than 
Horace  Greeley,  himself  entirely  self-taught. 

That  I  am  correct  in  respect  to  Mr.  Greeley's  wise  appreci- 
ation of  literature  is  substantiated  not  only  by  what  has  been 
set  forth  in  regard  to  The  Tribune's  labours  and  influence 


THE  TRIBUNE  IN   LITERATURE.  187 

herein,  but  by  the  fact  that  so  many  works  of  acknowledged 
place  in  our  letters  have  been  produced  by  Mr.  Greeley  him- 
self and  by  his  assistants  on  the  great  journal  he  founded. 
This  is  not  the  place  to  speak  critically  or  in  full  detail  of 
these  literary  labours.  It  cannot  but  be  recollected,  however, 
that  Mr.  Bayard  Taylor,  who  has  enriched  the  literature  of  his 
own  and  of  other  countries,  with  poetry,  romance,  and  travels, 
is  a  graduate  of  The  Tribune.  The  most  extensive  and  the 
most  useful  of  American  cyclopedias  was  prepared  under  the 
editorial  supervision  of  Mr.  Dana  and  Mr.  Ripley.  This  work 
was  so  well  received,  that  a  second  edition,  carefully  revised 
and  materially  enlarged  and  improved  by  the  same  editors,  was 
issued  in  1873.  Mr.  Dana  has  written  and  edited  other  works 
which  will  long  be  found  in  every  well-regulated  library.  A 
few  years  ago  a  work  was  published  entitled  "  Tribune  Essays," 
being  a  collection  of  editorials  by  Mr.  Congdon,  one  of  the 
associate  editors  of  The  Tribune.  The  most  of  the  articles 
were  upon  the  subject  of  slavery,  whose  adherents  were 
laughed  at  and  satirized  by  Mr.  Congdon  in  the  happiest  pos- 
sible manner.  The  subject  has  become  obsolete,  but  if  one 
wishes  to  find  the  finest  humour  in  the  most  polished  style,  I 
know  not  where  to  direct  him  other  than  to  this  volume  of 
Tribune  Essays.  The  work  is  pervaded  throughout  by  an 
elevated  tone  of  political  morality,  which,  most  unfortunately, 
the  destruction  of  slavery  has  not  engrafted  into  the  conduct 
of  our  national  affairs.  The  rush  for  notoriety  has  crowded 
our  book  marts  with  innumerable  works  of  an  ephemeral 
nature;  but  year  by  year,  generation  by  generation,  the  sifting 
process  goes  on  and  the  good  alone  will  be  finally  left.  Then 
it  will,  perhaps,  be  found  that  from  no  one  quarter  were  pro- 
duced so  many  works  of  value  and  literary  merit,  as  by  the 
Editor  and  Assistant  Editors  of  The  New- York  Tribune  during 
the  years  of  Horace  Greeley's  control  of  the  paper. 


CHAPTEK   XII. 

ERA  OF  THE  MEXICAN  WAR— GEN.  TAYLOR,  PRESIDENT. 

The  Tribune  from  1844  to  1848— Its  Era  of  Irrepressible  Conflicts  — Rapid 
Review  of  its  Battles  —  Moves  on  to  Anti-Slavery — Its  Hostility  to  the 
"War  with  Mexico — Enthusiastic  Sympathy  with  Popular  Movements 
in  Europe — "  Slieve-gammon  "  —  Tribune  Office  Burned  —  Mr.  Gree- 
ley  Visits  the  West — The  Presidential  Campaign  of  1848 — Mr.  Gree- 
ley  Dissatisfied  with  the  Nomination  of  General  Taylor  —  Declines 
to  Support  the  Ticket — Speech  at  Vauxhall  Garden  —  Nominated  for 
Congress — Taylor  and  Clay. 

THE  defeat  of  Henry  Clay  for  the  Presidency  in  1844,  aroused 
Mr.  Greeley  to  a  more  profound  consideration  of  the  question 
of  slavery  than,  as  an  editor,  he  had  yet  given  it.  The  com- 
mon people  have  an  adage,  that  if  our  fore-sights  were  as  good 
as  our  hind-sights,  we  should  oftener  hit  the  mark.  We  are 
apt  to  do  injustice  to  men  who  were  unable  to  foresee  events 
of  which  we  have  full  knowledge.  Thus,  in  the  case  of  Horace 
Greeley,  it  is  easily  to  be  seen,  in  1873,  that  the  Liberal  party 
of  1844  more  truly  represented  his  views  than  the  Whig  party. 
But  it  would  be  most  unjust  to  conclude  that,  therefore,  he 
made  a  mistake  in  1844.  lie  was  abreast  with  the  times;  and 
cannot  be  justly  censured  for  not  being  ahead  of  them.  After 
the  election  of  Mr.  Polk,  The  Tribune  became  an  anti-slavery 
paper.  Before  that  event,  Mi*.  Greeley  had  believed  in  the 
wrongfulness  of  slavery,  but  his  journal  had  rather  deprecated 
the  agitation  of  the  subject  as  tending  to  be  of  injury  rather 
than  benelit  to  the  slaves.  Heretofore  Horace  Greeley,  the 
politician,  had  in  this  matter,  mastered  Horace  Greeley,  the 
reformer.  But  in  1845,  he  said:  "  When  we  find  the  Union  on 
the  brink  of  a  most  unjust  and  rapacious  war,  instigated  wholly 
(as  is  officially  proclaimed)  by  a  determination  to  uphold  and 
fortify  slavery,  then  we  do  not  see  how  it  can  longer  be  ration- 
ally disputed  that  the  North  has  much,  very  much,  to  do  with 


A   FIGHTING   ERA.  189 

slavery.  If  we  may  be  drawn  in  to  fight  for  it,  it  would  be 
hard  indeed  that  we  should  not  be  allowed  to  talk  of  it." 
Henceforth  Mr.  Greeley  and  The  Tribune  did  "  talk  of  it," 
uttering  no  uncertain  sound. 

But  before  The  Tribune  came  to  be  called  an  "  abolition  " 
journal,  it  had  an  era  of  disputes  with  its  cotemporary  jour- 
nals of  the  city  of  a  remarkable  nature.  The  three  or  four 
years  following  the  defeat  of  Henry  Clay  may  be  well  styled 
the  era  of  The  Tribune's  irrepressible  conflicts.  We  have 
already  related  the  account  of  Mr.  Greeley's  famous  dispute 
with  Mr.  Raymond  upon  the  subject  of  Socialism.  And  as 
herein  The  Tribune  was  supposed  to  purpose  unrelenting  war 
against  society,  order,  property,  it  was  but  natural  that  it 
should  call  up  against  it  an  army  of  foes.  The  Democratic 
press  naturally  assailed  its  most  vigorous  opponent;  but  the 
Whig  journals  of  the  city  and  many  of  the  country  were 
scarcely  less  hostile  than  those  of  the  party  opposed.  Two 
classes  of  people  inevitably  have  many  to  kick  at  them :  the 
highly  successful,  and  those  who  have  the  misfortune  to  fail. 
Mr.  Greeley  was  highly  successful.  In  a  few  years,  he  had 
moved  on  from  the  position  of  an  awkward,  ill  dressed  country- 
man, to  a  position  of  vast  influence.  His  name  was  upon 
every  tongue;  his  journal  had  become  almost  a  necessity  to 
hundreds  of  thousands  of  persons.  There  were  those, — there 
always  are, — who  were  envious  of  this  success.  They  deter- 
mined to  put  down  the  successful  man.  And  as  he  did  have 
many  opinions  which  were  then  decidedly  unpopular,  there 
seemed  to  be  reasons  for  assailing  him. 

The  liberal  views  of  Mr.  Greeley  upon  the  subject  of  reli- 
gion were  made  to  figure  as  a  charge  of  "  infidelity."  To  an 
assault  of  this  kind  by  the  Express,  Mr.  Greeley  replied : 

"The  editor  of  The  Tribune  has  never  been  anything  else  than  a  believer 
in  the  Christian  Religion,  and  has  for  many  years  been  a  member  of  a 
Christian  Church.  He  never  wrote  or  uttered  a  syllable  in  favour  of 
Infidelity.  But  truth  is  lost  on  The  Express,  which  can  never  forgive  us 
the  '  Infidelity '  of  circulating  a  good  many  more  copies,  Daily  aud 
Weekly,  than  are  taken  of  that  paper." 


190  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GKEELEY. 

The  coarse  nature  of  the  assaults  made  upon  Mr.  Greeley 
during  these  years  may  be  judged  from  the  following,  taken 
from  The  Courier  and  Enquirer,  of  which  James  Watson  Webb 
was  editor.  Coloned  Webb  bad  been  sentenced  to  two  years' 
coniinement  in  the  penitentiary  for  the  crime  of  duelling,  but 
Governor  Seward  had  pardoned  him  after  a  few  hours'  incar- 
ceration. Colonel  Webb  said: 

"The  editor  of  The  Tribune  is  an  Abolitionist;  we  precisely  the  reverse. 
He  is  a  philosopher;  we  are  a  Christian.  He  is  a  pupil  of  Graham,  and 
would  have  all  the  world  live  upon  bran-bread  and  sawdust;  we  are  in 
favour  of  living  as  our  fathers  did,  and  of  enjoying  in  moderation  the 
good  things  which  Providence  has  bestowed  upon  us.  He  is  the  advocate 
of  the  Fourierism,  Socialism,  &nd  all  the  tomfooleries  which  have  given 
birth  to  the  debasing  and  disgusting  spectacles  of  vice  and  immorality 
which  Fanny  Wright,  Collins,  and  others  exhibit.  *****  ne 
seeks  for  notoriety  by  pretending  to  great  eccentricity  of  character  and 
habits,  and  by  the  strangeness  of  his  theories  and  practices;  we,  on  the 
contrary,  are  content  with  following  in  the  beaten  path,  and  accomplish- 
ing the  good  we  can,  in  the  old-fashioned  way.  He  lays  claim  to  great- 
ness by  wandering  through  the  streets  with  a  hat  double  the  size  of  his 
head,  a  coat  after  the  fashion  of  Jacob's  of  old,  with  one  leg  of  his  panta- 
loons inside  and  the  other  outside  of  his  boot,  and  with  boots  all  bespat- 
tered with  mud,  or,  possibly,  a  shoe  on  one  foot  and  a  boot  on  the  other, 
and  glorying  in  an  unwashed  and  unshaven  person.  We,  on  the  contrary, 
eschew  all  such  affectation  as  weak  and  silly;  we  think  there  is  a  difference 
between  notoriety  and  distinction;  we  recognize  the  social  obligation  to 
act  and  dress  according  to  our  station  in  life;  and  we  look  upon  clean- 
liness of  person  as  inseparable  from  purity  of  thought  and  benevolence  of 
heart.  In  short,  there  is  not  the  slightest  resemblance  between  the  editor 
of  The  Tribune  and  ourself,  politically,  morally,  or  socially ;  and  it  is  only 
when  his  affectation  and  impudence  are  unbearable,  that  we  condescend 
to  notice  him  or  his  press." 

Mr.  Greeley  replied: 

"  It  is  true  that  the  Editor  of  The  Tribune  chooses  mainly  (not  entire,y; 
vegetable  food;  but  he  never  troubles  his  readers  on  the  subject;  it  doea 
not  wrong  them;  why  should  it  concern  the  Colonel?  It  is  hard  for 
philosophy  that  so  humble  a  man  shall  be  made  to  stand  as  its  exemplar; 
while  Christianity  is  personified  by  the  hero  of  the  Sunday  duel  with  Hon. 
Tom.  Marshall ;  but  such  luck  will  happen. 

"As  to  our  personal  appearance,  it  does  seem  time  that  we  should  say 
something,  to  stay  the  flood  of  nonsense  with  which  the  town  must  by  this 
time  be  nauseated.  Some  donkey  a  while  ago,  apparently  anxious  to  assail 
or  annoy  the  editor  of  this  paper,  and  not  well  .knowing  with  what, 


JAMES   WATSON   WEBB  191 

originated  the  story  of  his  carelessness  of  personal  appearance;  and  since 
then  every  blockhead  of  the  same  disposition  and  distressed  by  a  similar 
lack  of  ideas,  has  repeated  and  exaggerated  the  foolery;  until  from  its 
origin  in  the  Albany  Microscope  it  has  sunk  down  at  last  to  the  columns 
of  The  Courier  and  Enquirer,  growing  more  absurd  at  every  landing.  Yet 
all  this  time  the  object  of  this  silly  raillery  has  doubtless  worn  better 
clothes  than  two-thirds  of  those  who  thus  assailed  him  —  better  than  any 
of  them  could  honestly  wear,  if  they  paid  their  debts  otherwise  than  by 
bankruptcy ;  while,  if  they  are  indeed  more  cleanly  than  he,  they  must 
bathe  very  thoroughly  not  less  than  twice  a  day.  The  editor  of  The 
Tribune  is  the  son  of  a  poor  and  humble  farmer;  came  to  New- York  a 
minor,  without  a  friend  within  200  miles,  less  than  ten  dollars  in  his 
pocket,  and  precious  little  besides;  he  has  never  had  a  dollar  from  a  rela- 
tive, and  has  for  years  laboured  under  a  load  of  debt  (thrown  on  him  by 
others'  misconduct  and  the  revulsion  of  1837),  which  he  can  now  just  see 
to  the  end  of.  Thenceforth  he  may  be  able  to  make  a  better  show,  if 
deemed  essential  by  his  friends;  for  himself  he  has  not  much  time  or 
thought  to  bestow  on  the  matter.  That  he  ever  affected  eccentricity  is  most 
untrue ;  and  certainly  no  costume  he  ever  appeared  in  would  create  such 
a  sensation  in  Broadway  as  that  James  Watson  Webb  would  have  worn 
but  for  the  clemency  of  Governor  Seward.  Heaven  grant  our  assailant 
may  never  hang  with  such  weight  on  another  Whig  Executive!  We 
drop  him." 

Commenting  upon  this  article,  in  his  Life  of  Raymond,  Mr. 
Maverick  says :  "  Colonel  Webb  made  no  reply.  Mr.  Greeley 
had  flattened  him."  The  Colonel  was  so  enraged,  however, 
that  he  undertook  to  incite  a  mob  against  The  Tribune,  where- 
upon Mr.  Greeley  said: 

"  This  is  no  new  trick  on  the  part  of  The  Courier.  It  is  not  the  first  nor 
the  second  time  that  it  has  attempted  to  excite  a  mob  to  violence  and 
outrage  against  those  whom  it  hates.  In  July,  1834,  when,  owing  to  its 
ferocious  denunciations  of  the  Abolitionists,  a  furious  and  law-defying 
mob  held  virtual  possession  of  our  city,  assaulting  dwellings,  churches, 
and  persons  obnoxious  to  its  hate,  and  when  the  Mayor  called  out  the 
citizens  by  Proclamation  to  assist  in  restoring  tranquillity,  The  Courier 
(llth  July)  proclaimed: 

"'  It  is  time,  for  the  reputation  of  the  city,  and  perhaps  for  the  welfare 
of  themselves,  that  these  Abolitionists  and  Amalgamationists  should  know 
the  ground  on  which  they  stand.  They  are,  we  learn,  always  clamourous 
with  the  Police  for  protection,  and  demand  it  as  a  right  inherent  to  their 
characters  as  American  citizens.  Now  we  tell  them  that,  when  they  openly 
and  publicly  outrage  public  feeling,  they  hate  no  right  to  demand  protection 
from  tlie  People  they  thus  insult.  When  they  endeavour  to  disseminate 
opinions  which,  if  generally  imbibed,  must  infallibly  destroy  our  National 


192  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

Union,  and  produce  scenes  of  blood  and  carnage  horrid  to  think  of;  when 
they  thus  preach  up  treason  and  murder,  the  cegis  of  the  Law  indignantly 
withdraws  its  suiter  from  them. 

"  '  When  they  vilify  our  religion  by  classing  the  Redeemer  of  the  world 
in  the  lowest  grade  of  the  human  species ;  when  they  debase  the  noble 
race  from  which  we  spring  —  that  race  which  called  civilization  into 
existence,  and  from  which  have  proceeded  all  the  great,  the  brave,  and 
the  good  that  have  ever  lived  —  and  place  it  in  the  same  scale  as  the 
most  stupid,  ferocious,  and  cowardly  of  the  divisions  into  which  the  Crea- 
tor has  divided  mankind,  then  they  place  themselves  beyond  the  pale  of  all 
law,  for  they  violate  every  law,  divine  and  human.  Ought  not,  we  ask, 
our  City  authorities  to  make  them  understand  this ;  to  tell  them  that  they 
prosecute  their  treasonable  and  beastly  plans  at  their  own  peril  F 

"  Such  is  the  man,  such  the  means,  by  which  he  seeks  to  bully  Freemen 
oat  of  the  rights  of  Free  Speech  and  Free  Thought.  There  are  those  who 
cower  before  his  threats  and  his  ruffian  appeals  to  mob  violence — here  is 
one  who  never  will !  All  the  powers  of  Land-jobbing  and  Slave-jobbing 
cannot  drive  us  one  inch  from  the  ground  we  have  assumed  of  determined 
and  open  hostility  to  this  atrocious  war,  its  contrivers  and  abettors.  Let 
those  who  threaten  us  with  assassination  understand,  onc,e  for  all,  that  we 
pity  while  we  despise  their  baseness." 

In  hostility  to  the  Mexican  war,  Mr.  Greeley  was  constantly 
outspoken.  Many  Whigs,  many  friends  of  The  Tribune  and 
of  Mr.  Greeley  thought  that  herein  his  course  was  impolitic, 
as  it  surely  was  not  popular.  At  last,  in  reply  to  complaining 
letters,  he  said: 

"  Our  faith  is  strong  and  clear  that  we  serve  our  country  best  by  obey, 
ing  our  Maker  in  all  things,  and  that  he  requires  us  to  bear  open,  un- 
equivocal testimony  against  every  iniquity,  however  specious,  and  to 
expose  every  lying  pretense  whereby  men  are  instigated  to  imbrue  their 
hands  in  each  other's  blood.  We  do  not  believe  it  possible  that  our 
country  can  be  prospered  in  such  a  war  as  this.  It  may  be  victorious,  it 
may  acquire  immense  accessions  of  territory;  but  these  victories,  these 
acquisitions,  will  prove  fearful  calamities,  by  sapping  the  morals  of  our 
people,  by  inflating  them  with  pride  and  corrupting  them  with  the  lust 
of  conquest  and  of  gold,  and  leading  them  to  look  to  the  commerce  of  the 
Indies  and  the  dominion  of  the  seas  for  those  substantial  blessings  which 
follow  only  in  the  wake  of  peaceful,  contented  Labour.  So  sure  as  the 
universe  has  a  Ruler  will  every  acre  of  territory  we  acquire  by  this  war 
prove  to  our  nation  a  curse  and  the  source  of  infinite  calamities." 

It  was  an  unpleasant  duty  to  quote  the  foregoing  extracts 
from  The  Courier  and  Enquirer  and  The  Tribune.  But  I  con- 
cluded, after  deliberate  consideration,  that  it  was  a  duty.  It 


REVOLUTIONS   IN   EUROPE.  193 

will  hardly  be  disputed,  I  suppose,  by  any  one  whose  judgment 
is  entitled  to  respect,  that  Mr.  Greeley  had  a  genuinely  benig- 
nant, benevolent  nature.  This  is  shown  by  innumerable  facts, 
from  his  school  days  till  the  time  when  the  shadow  of  death 
encompassed  him.  About  this  very  time,  he  frequently  deliv- 
ered a  lecture  beginning:  "To  do  good  is  the  proper  business 
of  life — to  qualify  for  earnestness  and  efficiency  in  doing  good, 
is  the  true  end  of  Education.  The  sum  of  all  true  knowledge 
in  the  child  is  a  consciousness  that  he  lives  not  for  himself,  but 
for  his  Creator  and  his  Race."  This  grand  truth  Mr.  Greeley 
was  all  the  time  endeavouring  to  enforce  by  example,  by  speech, 
by  writings.  Is  it  any  wonder  that,  finding  himself  misunder- 
stood, grossly  misrepresented  by  the  selfish,  assailed  with 
bitter  vindictiveness  by  those  who  were  envious  of  his  substan- 
tial success,  that  he  came  to  his  own  defense  with  an  earnest- 
ness which  sometimes  boiled  over  in  wrath,  and  caused  him  to 
make  use  of  abusive  expressions  which  it  had  been  well  had 
they  never  been  uttered?  Under  such  assaults  as  he  received, 
patience,  though  sublime,  was  exhausted;  generosity,  though 
unbounded,  was  consumed;  and,  forced  into  the  fight,  he 
delivered  battle  with  terrible  effect  and  a  mercilessness  which 
may  be  described  as  almost  savage.  He  won  the  victory;  but 
the  effect  of  the  long  conflict  was  to  give  bitterness  to  a  nature 
with  which  bitterness  was  not  congenial.  And  this  acquired 
quality  clung  to  him  throughout  the  remainder  of  his  life,  and 
was  the  origin  of  some  of  its  most  unhappy  incidents ;  incidents 
which,  with  their  accompanying  expressions,  injured  the  har- 
mony and  dimmed  the  beauty  of  a  character  of  such  surpassing 
greatness  and  natural  goodness. 

But  if  Mr.  Greeley  found  reason  to  oppose  the  Mexican  war, 
he  found  wars  taking  place  in  other  parts  of  the  world,  in 
which  he  took  the  deepest  interest.  Late  in  May,  1848,  the 
steamship  Cambria  arrived  at  New-York  from  Liverpool, 
bringing  intelligence  of  the  abdication  of  Louis  Philippe,  King 
of  France;  of  the  proclamation  of  the  French  Republic;  of 
other  events  which  were  the  thrilling  precursors  of  those  revo- 
lutionary attempts  in  France,  Germany,  Hungary,  Italy,  and 
Ireland,  for  whose  success  the  sympathies  of  the  American 
13 


194  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GEEELEY. 

people  generally  were  profoundly  interested.  Though  Margaret 
Fuller  was  at  this  time  in  Europe,  a  correspondent  of  The 
Tribune,  and  its  bureau  in  the  old  world  was  well  conducted, 
Mr.  Dana  was  sent  abroad  with  the  object  of  procuring  the 
fullest  and  most  reliable  intelligence  touching  the  revolutionary 
movements.  He  wrote  a  series  of  letters  to  The  Tribune, 
signing  them  with  the  initials  of  his  name,  which  gave  the 
paper  great  interest  and  value,  and  which  may  yet  be  consulted 
with  profit  by  those  who  appreciate  the  lessons  of  that  eventful 
epoch.  Mr.  Greeley  himself  was  animated  by  great  enthusiasm 
for  the  popular  cause,  and  wrote  articles  almost  daily  upon  the 
subject.  He  was  placed  upon  the  "  Directory  of  the  Friends 
of  Ireland,"  of  which  he  remained  an  active  member,  and  to 
the  funds  of  which  he  contributed  with  characteristic  liberality. 
One  may  find  at  this  day  in  the  files  of  The  Tribune  of  the 
remarkable  era  under  consideration  sufficient  data  upon  which 
to  construct  a  full  and  valuable  history  of  events  which  con- 
vulsed a  continent,  but,  unhappily,  without  the  immediate 
benefit  to  mankind  which  the  friends  of  man  so  sanguinely 
hoped.  Mr.  Greeley  was  exceedingly  hopeful,  but  his  judg- 
ment was  not  so  far  swayed  by  his  sentiments  as  to  injure  the 
value  of  his  advice,  or  throw  suspicion  upon  the  sincerity  of 
his  warnings. 

A  somewhat  amusing  event  in  newspaper  circles  occurred  in 
connexion  with  current  events  in  Ireland.  The  country  was 
in  excited  expectation  in  regard  to  the  Irish  rebellion,  when 
The  Tribune  published  three  letters,  dated  at  Dublin  about  the 
first  of  'August  giving  an  account  of  "  the  battle  of  Slievena- 
mon,"  in  which  the  commander  of  the  British  forces  and  sev- 
eral thousand  troops  were  reported  killed  by  the  populace. 
The  Irish  and  their  friends  were  greatly  elated;  but  it  soon 
transpiring  that  no  such  affair  had  occurred,  The  Tribune  was 
charged  with  imposing  upon  the  public.  The  truth  was,  The 
Tribune  was  imposed  upon  by  the  correspondent,  and  he  had 
written  the  letters  in  good  faith,  believing  every  word  he  said. 
Dublin  was  all  excitement,  and  the  Slievenamon  affair  was 
there  by  many  believed  to  have  occurred.  It  is  hardly  neces 
Bary  to  say  that  The  Tribune's  cotemporaries  made  no  small 


BTJENED   OLT.  195 

sport  of  tin's  "  Slievegamrnon  "  business  as  tliey  called  it.  'At 
ihe  time  of  the  appearance  of  the  letters  Mr.  Greeley  was  out 
of  the  city,  looking  after  copper-mines  in  Michigan. 

But  the  period  from  the  defeat  of  Henry  Clay  to  the  election 
of  General  Taylor  of  which  we  are  now  treating,  was  one  not 
only  of  tierce  conflicts  at  home  and  abroad,  but  one  of  varied 
fortune  in  The  Tribune.  Mr.  Polk  had  not  yet  been  inaugu- 
rated, when  the  building  in  which  The  Tribune  was  published 
was  destroyed  by  fire.  This  was  on  the  morning  of  February 
5,  1845.  The  catastrophe  is  thus  described  by  The  Tribune 
of  the  next  morning: 


Q  ' 


"At  4  o'clock,  yesterday  morning,  a  boy  in  our  employment  entered  our 
publication  office,  as  usual,  and  kindled  a  lire  in  the  stove  for  the  day, 
after  which  he  returned  to  the  mailing-room  below,  and  resumed  folding 
newspapers.  Half  an  hour  afterward  a  clerk,  who  slept  on  the  counter  of 
the  publication  office,  was  awakened  by  a  sensation  of  heat,  and  found  the 
room  in  flames.  He  escaped  with  a  slight  scorching.  A  hasty  effort  was 
made  by  two  or  three  persons  to  extinguish  the  fire  by  casting  water  upon 
it,  but  the  fierce  wind  then  blowing  rushed  in  as  the  doors  were  opened, 
and  drove  the  flames  through  the  building  with  inconceivable  rapidity. 
Mr.  Graham  and  our  clerk,  Robert  M.  Strebeigh,  were  sleeping  in  the 
second  story,  until  awakened  by  the  roar  of  the  flames,  their  room  being 
full  of  smoke  and  fire.  The  door  and  stairway  being  on  fire,  they  escaped 
with  only  their  night-clothes,  by  jumping  from  a  rear  window,  each  losing 
a  gold  watch,  and  Mr.  Graham  nearly  $500  in  cash,  which  was  in  his 
pocket-book  under  his  pillow.-  Robert  was  somewhat  cut  in  the  face,  on 
striking  the  ground,  but  not  seriously.  In  our  printing-office,  fifth  story 
two  compositors  were  at  work  making  up  The  Weekly  Tribune  for  the 
press,  and  had  barely  time  to  escape  before  the  stairway  was  in  flames.  In 
the  basement  our  pressmen  were  at  work  on  The  Daily  Tribune  of  the 
morning,  and  had  printed  about  three-fourths  of  the  edition.  The  balance 
of  course  went  with  everything  else,  including  a  supply  of  paper,  and  The 
Weekly  Tribune,  printed  on  one  side.  A  few  books  were  hastily  caught 
up  and  saved,  but  nothing  else — not  even  the  daily  form,  on  which  the 
pressmen  were  working.  So  complete  a  destruction  of  a  daily  newspaper 
office  was  never  known.  From  the  editorial  rooms,  not  a  paper  was  saved ; 
and,  besides  all  the  editor's  own  manuscripts,  correspondence,  and  collec- 
tion of  valuable  books,  some  manuscripts  belonging  to  friends,  of  great 
value  to  them,  are  gone. 

"Our  loss,  so  far  as  money  can  replace  it,  is  about  $18,000,  of  which 
$10,000  was  covered  by  insurance.  The  loss  of  property  which  insurance 
would  not  cover,  we  feel  more  keenly.  If  our  mail-books  come  out  whole 
from  our  Salamander  safe,  now  buried  among  the  burning  ruins,  we  shall 
be  gratefully  content. 


196  LITE   OF   HORACE   GREELET. 

**  It  is  usual  on  such  occasions  to  ask, '  Why  were  you  not  fully  insured  ?  * 
It  was  impossible,  from  the  nature  of  our  business,  that  we  should  be  so ; 
and  no  man  could  have  imagined  that  such  an  establishment,  in  which 
men  were  constantly  at  work  night  and  day,  could  be  wholly  consumed 
by  fire.  There  has  not  been  another  night,  since  the  building  was  put  up, 
when  it  could  have  been  burned  down,  even  if  deliberately  fired  for  that 
purpose.  But  when  this  fire  broke  out,  under  a  strong  gale  and  snow- 
storm of  twenty-four  hours'  continuance,  which  had  rendered  the  streets 
impassable,  it  was  well-nigh  impossible  to  drag  an  engine  at  all.  Some  of 
them  could  not  be  got  out  of  their  houses;  others  were  dragged  a  few  rods 
and  then  given  up  of  necessity ;  and  those  which  reached  the  fire  found 
the  nearest  hydrant  frozen  up,  and  only  to  be  opened  with  an  axe.  Mean- 
time, the  whole  building  was  in  a  blaze." 

By  the  kind  assistance  of  other  offices  and  energy  on  the  part 
of  Tribune  management,  the  paper  was  published  as  usual  the 
next  day.  Shortly  afterwards  these  "Reflections  over  the 
Fire"  appeared: 

"  We  have  been  called,  editorially,  to  scissor  out  a  great  many  fires,  both 
small  and  great,  and  have  done  so  with  cool  philosophy,  not  reflecting 
how  much  to  some  one  man  the  little  paragraph  would  most  assuredly 
mean.  The  late  complete  and  summary  burning  up  of  our  office,  licked  up 
clean  as  it  was  by  the  red  flames,  in  a  few  hours,  has  taught  us  a  lesson  on 
this  head.  Aside  from  all  pecuniary  loss,  how  great  is  the  suffering  pro- 
duced by  a  fire!  A  hundred  little  articles  of  no  use  to  any  one  save  the 
owner,  things  that  people  would  look  at  day  after  day,  and  see  nothing  in, 
that  we  ourselves  have  contemplated  with  cool  indifference,  now  that  they 
are  irrevocably  destroyed,  come  up  in  the  shape  of  reminiscences,  and 
seem  as  if  they  had  been  worth  their  weight  in  gold. 

"  We  would  not  indulge  in  unnecessary  sentiment,  but  even  the  old  desk 
at  which  we  sat,  the  ponderous  inkstand,  the  familiar  faces  of  files  of  Cor- 
respondence, the  choice  collection  of  pamphlets,  the  unfinished  essay,  the 
charts  by  which  we  steered — can  they  all  have  vanished,  never  more  to  be 
seen  ?  Truly  your  fire  makes  clean  work,  and  is,  of  all  executive  officers, 
super-eminent.  Perhaps  that  last  choice  batch  of  letters  may  be  some- 
where on  file ;  we  are  almost  tempted  to  cry,  'Devil !  find  it  up !'  Poh !  it 
is  a  mere  cinder  now ;  some 

Fathoms  deep  my  letter  lies; 
Of  its  lines  is  tinder  made,1 

"  No  Arabian  tale  can  cradle  a  wilder  fiction,  or  show  better  how  alto- 
gether illusory  life  is.  Those  solid  walls  of  brick,  those  five  decent  stories, 
those  steep  and  difficult  stairs,  the  swinging  doors,  the  Sanctum,  scene  of 
many  a  deep  political  drama,  of  many  a  pathetic  tale,  utterly  whiffed  out, 
as  one  summarily  snuffs  out  a  spermaceti  on  retiring  for  the  night.  And 
all  perfectly  true. 


"THE  FAR  WEST."  197 

One  always  has  some  private  satisfaction  in  his  own  particular  misery. 
Consider  what  a  night  it  was  that  burnt  us  out,  that  we  were  conquered 
by  the  elements,  went  up  in  flames  heroically  on  the  wildest,  windiest, 
stormiest  night  these  dozen  years,  not  by  any  fault  of  human  enterprise, 
but  fairly  conquered  by  stress  of  weather ; — there  was  a  great  flourish  of 
trumpets  at  all  events. 

"And  consider,  above  all,  that  Salamander  safe;  how,  after  all,  the  fire, 
assisted  by  the  elements,  only  came  off  second  best,  not  being  able  to 
reduce  that  safe  into  ashes.  That  is  the  streak  of  sunshine  through  the 
dun  wreaths  of  smoke,  the  combat  of  human  ingenuity  against  the  despe- 
rate encounter  of  the  seething  heat.  But  those  boots,  and  Webster's  Dic- 
tionary— well !  we  were  handsomely  whipped  there,  we  acknowledge." 

It  thus  appears  that  Mr.  Greeley  took  the  disaster  with 
philosophical  serenity.  Margaret  Fuller,  then  writing  for  The 
Tribune,  wrote  to  a  friend:  "You  have  heard  that  The  Tribune 
office  was  burned  to  the  ground.  For  a  day  I  thought  it  must 
make  a  difference,  but  it  has  served  only  to  increase  my  admi- 
ration for  Mr.  Greeley's  smiling  courage.  He  has  really  a 
strong  character."  In  about  ninety  days  the  office  was  rebuilt, 
making  one  of  the  most  complete  and  convenient  printing 
establishments  then  in  existence,  but  afterwards  greatly  sur- 
passed by  the  offices  of  other  daily  journals  in  New- York, 
Chicago,  and  Philadelphia. 

Ever  after  the  fire,  The  Tribune  kept  in  reserve  complete 
duplicate  materials,  so  that,  in  case  of  another  similar  accident, 
a  new  Tribune  could  instantly  be  set  in  motion.  This  dupli- 
cate office  was  generously  offered  to  a  Chicago  journal  after 
the  fearful  fire  which  destroyed  a  great  portion  of  that  city  in 
October,  1871. 

In  the  Spring  of  1847,  Mr.  Greeley  made  his  first  journey 
to  "  the  far  West."  Some  three  years  before  he  had  taken 
some  stock  in  a  mining  company  of  the  Lake  Superior  Copper 
region,  whose  deposits  of  mineral  wealth  had  then  been 
recently  discovered,  and  had  persuaded  others  to  do  likewise; 
and  now  made  a  business  visit  to  the  property,  taking  with 
him  cash  to  pay  off  workmen.  At  Detroit  he  bought  a  yoke 
of  oxen,  a  supply  of  forage,  provisions,  and  necessary  imple- 
ments, and  proceeded  on  his  journey.  He  found  Lake  Huron 
shrouded  in  fog  and  mist  throughout  its  entire  length.  "At 
the  Sault  Ste.  Marie,"  he  says,  "we  found  a  small  bat  smart 


198  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GKEELEY. 

young  village,  to  whose  assembled  inhabitants  two  of  us  made 
temperance  addresses,  which  I  think  some  of  them  needed." 
His  goods  were  taken  across  the  portage  by  wagon,  when  they 
and  their  owner  "  took  the  only  old  propeller  which  had,  as 
yet,  been  got  across  and  launched  on  Lake  Superior,  and 
started  up  the  lake." 

The  vessel  reached  Eagle  Harbour,  Mr.  Greeley's  place  of 
destination,  on  the  loth  of  June.  He  observed  that  the  shal- 
low water  of  the  harbour  was  frozen  over  next  morning  for 
some  distance  from  shore.  He  attended  to  the  business  in 
hand,  making  considerable  journeys  round  about  on  foot,  and 
being  wonderfully  annoyed  by  "  more  ferocious  clouds  of  mos- 
quitoes and  gnats  than  ever  before  or  since  presented  their 
bills,  and  insisted  on  immediate  satisfaction." 

Returning,  Mr.  Greeley  paid  a  visit  to  Chicago,  travelling 
per  steamer,  by  way  of  Mackinac,  Sheboygan,  and  Milwaukee. 
Chicago,  he  says,  was  "then  a  smart  and  growing  village, 
where  some  thousands  of  us  gathered  from  the  East  and  from 
the  West  in  a  grand  River  and  Harbour  Convention,  which 
was  organized  on  the  4th  of  July."  Mr.  Greeley  thought  the 
proceedings  of  this  Convention, — whereat  its  President,  Hon. 
Edward  Bates,  made  the  greatest  speech  of  his  long  public 
life, — gave  a  considerable  impetus  to  the  subsequent  great 
growth  of  Chicago.  He  adds,  descriptive  of  the  country  to 
the  westward  of  Chicago : 

"  When  the  Convention  had  closed  its  deliberations,  Mr.  John  Y.  Scammon, 
then  a  rising  young  lawyer,  since  an  eminent  banker  of  Chicago,  took  his 
carriage  and  pair,  and  drove  with  me  for  three  days  over  the  prairies  west 
of  that  city ;  crossing  Fox  River  at  Geneva,  proceeding  to  what  is  now  Syca- 
more, and  returning  by  Elgin  to  the  City  of  the  Lakes.  I  had,  eight  years 
earlier,  traversed  eastern  Michigan,  and  there  made  the  acquaintance  of 
what  were  called  'wet  prairies,'  by  which  I  had  not  been  fascinated.  But 
the  prairies  of  Illinois  are  of  another  order;  and,  though  by  no  means  that 
dead,  unbroken  level  which  many  suppose  them,  but  cut  up  by  brook- 
beds,  sloughs,  and  roads,  which  were  merely  wagon-tracks  in  a  deep, 
black  soil,  wore  a  generally  delightful  aspect.  Forests  were  less  frequent 
than  seemed  desirable ;  but  '  openings,'  or  scattered  trees,  were  never  out 
of  sight ;  and  the  small  and  scanty  settlements  were  usually  surrounded 
by  promising  fields  of  wheat  and  Indian  corn.  I  presume  we  did  not  see 
oue  human  habitation  where  a  traveller  over  our  route  would  now  see  fifty ; 


MILWAUKEE.  199 

while  the  average  value  or  cost  of  the  rude  cabins  we  passed  would  hardly 
exceed  $200,  where  that  of  the  present  houses  would  reach  at  least  $2,000. 
Teamsters  conveying  grain  to  Chicago,  or  returning  with  lumber,  we 
frequently  met;  yet  inns  were  decidedly  scarce;  since  few  teamsters  could 
afford  to  pay  money  for  food  or  shelter,  while  the  great  mass  stopped  for 
/est  or  meals  under  almost  any  tree,  turned  out  their  horses  to  graze,  or 
fed  them  from  their  wagons,  while  they  ate  of  the  substantial,  wholesome 
food  they  had  brought  from  home.  I  was  told  that  a  load  of  wheat  taken 
sixty  miles  to  Chicago  in  those  days  just  about  paid  for  a  return  load  of 
fence-boards,  leaving  the  farmer  who  made  the  exchange  little  or  nothing 
wherewith  to  pay  tavern-bills.  Few  of  the  early  pioneers  of  Illinois  took 
thither  more  than  a  fair  wagon-load  of  worldly  gear  and  $100  in  money; 
many  lacking  the  $100,  and  had  but  half  a  load  of  household  stuff  in  the 
wagon,  the  other  half  being  composed  of  wife  and  children  ;  yet  all  found 
somehow  enough  to  eat,  and  did  not  suffer  intolerably  from  cold;  and 
now  those  children  enjoy  comforts  and  many  revel  in  luxuries  which 
their  parents  scarcely  aspired  to.  Do  they  realize  and  fitly  honour  the  self- 
forgetting  courage  and  devotion  to  which  they  are  so  deeply  indebted  ?" 

Milwaukee  at  this  time  appeared  to  Mr.  Greeley  as  "  a  smart 
but  struggling  country  village,  consisting  of  some  three  or 
four  hundred  new  houses  clustered  about  a  steamboat  landing 
at  the  mouth  of  a  shallow,  crooked  creek."  Sheboygan  was 
then  relatively  of  far  greater  importance  than  now,  but  he 
reached  the  untouched  primeval  wilderness  within  two  miles 
from  the  steamboat-landing,  and  travelled  under  the  shade  of 
the  primitive  forest  through  most  of  the  succeeding  ten  miles 
to  the  residence  of  an  uncle  he  was  visiting.  And  yet  he  pre- 
dicted that  Wisconsin  at  the  close  of  the  nineteenth  century 
would  be  the  home  "  of  three  millions  of  people  as  energetic, 
industrious,  worthy,  and  happy,  as  any  on  earth."  At  this 
time  no  railway  reached  Chicago  and  "  barely  one  line  (the 
Michigan  Central)  pointed  directly  at  that  young  city."  He 
crossed  the  lake  by  steamer,  and  thence  went  to  Kalamazoo  by 
stage,  where  he  took  cars  for  Detroit,  and  going  hence  to 
Buft'alo  by  steamer,  by  rail  to  Albany,  reached  home  by  a 
North  River  steamer. 

Toward  the  close  of  August,  1848,  Mr.  Greeley  again  visited 
his  Lake  Superior  mining  property,  and  found  that  encourag- 
ing progress  had  been  made  since  his  former  visit.  The 
investment  never  brought  him,  however,  any  notable  profits. 
On  this  visit  he  tested  the  assertion  that  the  waters  of  Lake 


200  LIFE  OF  HORACE   GREELEY. 

Superior  are  at  all  times  too  cold  to  bathe  in.  "  I  stripped,'* 
he  says,  "and  plunged  in;  but  was  driven  out  as  by  a  legion 
of  infuriated  hornets.  The  water  was  too  cold  to  be  endured; 
and  I  never  thereafter  doubted  the  assertion,  that  a  hot  day 
was  never  known  on  that  Lake  at  a  distance  of  a  mile  or  more 
from  land." 

This  was  also  the  year  of  a  presidential  campaign.  The 
Democratic  convention,  held  at  Baltimore,  had  nominated 
General  Lewis  Cass,  of  Michigan,  and  General  "William  O. 
Butler,  of  Kentucky,  for  President  and  Vice- President  respect- 
ively, in  the  latter  part  of  May.  The  Whigs  held  their  con- 
vention in  Philadelphia,  on  the  7th  of  June  following,  and  had 
several  days'  stormy  sessions.  Mr.  Greeley,  who  was  present, 
earnestly  desired  the  nomination  of  Henry  Clay,  and  an 
endorsement  of  the  Wilmot  Proviso  in  the  platform.  Unabl^ 
to  secure  either  the  one  or  the  other,  he  left  the  convention  in 
disgust,  and  for  some  time  refused,  both  personally  and  edito- 
rially, to  support  the  ticket  nominated, —  General  Zachary 
Taylor,  of  Louisiana,  for  President,  and  Millard  Fillmore,  of 
New  York,  for  Vice-President.  Large  numbers  of  Whigs 
throughout  the  country  heartily  sympathized  with  Mr.  Gree- 
ley, and  the  disaffection  might  have  been  fatal  to  success,  but 
for  even  greater  disaffection,  in  the  Democratic  party,  with  the 
Baltimore  nominations.  A  "  Free  Democratic  Convention  " 
was  held  at  Buffalo,  in  August,  and  Martin  Van.  Buren,  Ex- 
President,  was  nominated  for  the  first  place,  the  Hon.  Charles 
Francis  Adams,  of  Massachusetts,  for  the  second  place  on  the 
ticket. 

Meantime,  however,  the  disaffection  of  the  Whigs  had 
greatly  decreased.  General  Taylor  pronounced  himself  "a 
Whig,  though  not  an  ultra  Whig."  And,  generally,  as  his 
history  and  character  became  better  known,  respect  for  him 
increased.  Slowly  though  surely  the  friends  of  Mr.  Clay,  who 
were  also  quite  generally  throughout  the  North  advocates  of  a 
Protective  Tariff  and  slavery  restriction,  were  induced  to  sup- 
port the  ticket.  The  reasons  for  the  course  of  such  were  not 
oetter  stated,  perhaps,  than  they  were  by  Mr.  Greeley  in  a 
speech  at  Vauxhall  Garden,  New- York,  not  long  after  his 


VAUXIIALL   GARDEN   SPEECH.  201 

return  from  Lake  Superior,  namely  on  the  27th  of  September. 
Happening  to  attend  a  Whig  meeting  there,  Mr.  Greeley.waa 
called  out,  and  responded  in  a  speech,  which  may  be  read  with 
profit  to  this  day.  It  has  been  in  substance  reported  thus : 

"  1  trust,  fellow-citizens,  I  shall  never  be  afraid  nor  ashamed  to  meet  a 
Whig  assemblage  and  express  my  sentiments  on  the  political  questions  of 
the  day.  And  although  I  have  had  no  intimation  till  now  that  my 
presence  here  was  expected  or  desired,  I  am  the  more  ready  to  answer 
your  call  since  I  have  heard  intimations,  even  from  this  stand,  that  there 
was  some  mystery  in. my  course  to  be  cleared  up — some  astounding  revela- 
tion with  regard  to  it  to  be  expected.  And  our  eloquent  friend,  from  Ken- 
tucky even  volunteered,  in  his  remarks,  to  see  me  personally  and  get  me 
right.  If  there  be  indeed  any  mystery  in  the  premises,  I  will  do  my  best 
to  dispel  it.  But  I  have,  in  truth,  nothing  to  reveal.  I  stated  in  announc- 
ing Gen.  Taylor's  nomination,  the  day  after  it  was  made,  that  I  would 
support  it  if  I  saw  no  other  way  to  defeat  the  election  of  Lewis  Cass.  That 
pledge  I  have  ever  regarded.  I  shall  faithfully  redeem  it.  And,  since 
there  is  now  no  chance  remaining  that  any  other  than  Gen.  Taylor  or 
Gen.  Cass  can  be  elected,  I  shall  henceforth  support  the  ticket  nominated 
at  Philadelphia,  and  do  what  I  can  for  its  election. 

"  But  I  have  not  changed  my  opinion  of  the  nomination  of  Gen.  Taylor. 
I  believe  it  was  unwise  and  unjust.  For  Gen.  Taylor,  personally,  I  have 
ever  spoken  with  respect;  but  I  believe  a  candidate  could  and  should  have 
been  chosen  more  deserving,  more  capable,  more  popular.  I  cannot  pre- 
tend to  support  him  with  enthusiasm,  for  I  do  not  feel  any. 

"Yet  while  I  frankly  avow  that  I  would  do  little  merely  to  make  Gen. 
Taylor  President,  I  cannot  forget  that  others  stand  or  fall  with  him,  and 
that  among  them  are  Fillmore  and  Fish  and  Patterson,  with  whom  I  have 
battled  for  the  Whig  cause  ever  since  I  was  entitled  to  vote,  and  to  whom 
I  cannot  now  be  unfaithful.  I  cannot  forget  that  if  Gen.  Taylor  be  elected 
we  shall  in  all  probability  have  a  Whig  Congress;  if  Gen.  Cass  is  elected, 
a  Loco-Foco  Congress.  Who  can  ask  me  to  throw  away  all  these  because 
of  my  objections  to  Gen.  Taylor? 

"And  then  the  question  of  Free  Soil,  what  shall  be  the  fate  of  that?  I 
presume  there  are  here  some  Free  Soil  men  ['Yes!  Yes!  aZZFree  Soil!'] — 
I  mean  those  to  whom  the  question  of  extending  or  restricting  Slavery 
outweighs  all  other  considerations.  I  ask  these  what  hope  they  have  of 
keeping  Slavery  out  of  California  and  New-Mexico  with  Gen.  Cass  Presi- 
dent, and  a  Loco-Foco  Congress  ?  I  have  none.  And  I  appeal  to  every 
Free  Soil  Whig  to  ask  himself  this  question — '  How  would  South  Carolina 
and  Texas  wish  you  to  vote  ?'  Can  you  doubt  that  your  bitter  adversaries 
would  rejoice  to  hear  that  you  had  resolved  to  break  off  from  the  Whig 
party  and  permit  Gen.  Cass  to  be  chosen  President,  with  an  obedient  Con- 
gress? /cannot  doubt  it.  And  I  cannot  believe  that  a  wise  or  worthy 
course,  which  my  bitterest  adversaries  would  gladly  work  out  for  me. 


202  LIFE   OF  HORACE  GREELEY. 

"  Of  Gen.  Taylor's  soundness  on  this  question,  I  feel  no  assurance,  and 
can  give  none.  But  I  believe  him  clearly  pledged  by  his  letters  to  leave 
legislation  to  Congress,  and  not  attempt  to  control  by  his  veto  the  policy 
of  the  country.  I  believe  a  Whig  Congress  will  not  consent  to  extend 
Slavery,  and  that  a  Whig  President  will  not  go  to  war  with  Congress  and 
the  general  spirit  of  his  party.  So  believing,  I  shall  support  the  Whig 
nominations  with  a  view  to  the  triumph  of  Free  Soil,  trusting  that  the  day 
is  not  distant  when  an  amendment  of  the  Federal  Constitution  will  give 
the  appointment  of  Postmasters  and  other  local  officers  to  the  People,  and 
strip  the  President  of  the  enormous  and  anti-republican  patronage  which 
now  causes  the  whole  political  action  of  the  country  to  hinge  upon  its 
Presidential  Elections.  Such  are  my  views ;  such  will  be  my  course.  I 
trust  it  will  no  longer  be  pretended  that  there  is  any  mystery  about  them." 

"We  shall  presently  see  that  Mr.  Greeley  was  elected  to  Con- 
gress upon  the  same  ticket  with  General  Taylor.  After  the 
election,  Mr.  Brooks  published  a  card  of  thanksgiving  to  those 
who  had  voted  for  him  which  suggested  one  from  Mr.  Greeley. 
As  it  particularly  refers  to  matters  of  the  year  just  now  in 
review,  it  is  quoted  here: 

"TO  THE  ELECTORS  OF  THE  Vlra  CONGRESSIONAL  DISTRICT. 

"The  undersigned,  late  a  candidate  for  Congress,  respectfully  returns 
iis  thanks  —  first,  to  his  political  opponents  for  the  uniform  kindness  and 
consideration  with  which  he  was  treated  by  them  throughout  the  canvass, 
and  the  unsolicited  suffrages  with  which  he  was  honoured  by  many  of 
them ;  secondly,  to  the  great  mass  of  his  political  brethren,  for  the  ardent, 
enthusiastic,  and  effective  support  which  they  rendered  him ;  and,  lastly, 
to  that  small  portion  of  the  Whig  electors  who  saw  fit  to  withhold  from 
him  their  votes,  thereby  nearly  or  quite  neutralizing  the  support  he 
received  from  the  opposite  party.  Claiming  for  himself  the  right  to  vote 
for  or  against  any  candidate  of  his  party  as  his  own  sense  of  right  and 
duty  shall  dictate,  he  very  freely  accords  to  all  others  the  same  liberty, 
without  offence  or  inquisition. 

"  During  the  late  canvass  I  have  not,  according  to  my  best  recollection, 
spoken  of  myself,  and  have  not  replied  in  any  way  to  any  sort  of  attack  or 
imputation.  I  have  in  no  manner  sought  to  deprecate  the  objections,  nor 
to  soothe  the  terrors  of  that  large  and  most  influential  class  who  deem  my 
advocacy  of  Land  Reform  and  Social  Re-organization  synonymous  with 
Infidelity  and  systematic  Robbery.  To  have  entered  upon  explanations  or 
vindications  of  my  views  on  these  subjects  in  the  crisis  of  a  great  National 
struggle,  which  taxed  every  energy,  and  demanded  every  thought,  com- 
ported neither  with  my  leisure  nor  my  inclination. 

"Neither  have  I  seen  fit  at  any  time  to  justify  nor  allude  to  my  parti- 
cipation in  the  efforts  made  here  last  summer  to  aid  the  people  of  Ireland 
in  their  anticipated  struggle  for  Liberty  and  Independence.  I  shall  iiot  di 


GENERAL  TAYI.OK.  s  2l*{ 

so  now.  What  I  did  then,  in  behalf  of  the  Irish  millions,  I  stand  ready 
to  do  again,  so  far  as  my  means  will  permit,  when  a  similar  opportunity, 
with  a  like  prospect  of  success,  is  presented  —  and  not  for  them  only, 
but  for  any  equally  oppressed  and  suffering  people  on  the  face  of  the 
earth.  If  any  '  extortion  and  plunder '  were  contrived  and  perpetrated  in 
the  meetings  for  Ireland  at  Vauxhall  last  season,  I  am  wholly  unconscious 
of  it,  though  I  ought  to  be  as  well  informed  as  to  tbe  alleged  '  extortion 
and  plunder '  as  most  others,  whether  my  information  were  obtained  in 
the  character  of  conspirator  or  that  of  victim.  I  feel  impelled,  however, 
by  the  expressions  employed  in  Mr.  Brooks's  card,  to  state  that  I  have 
found  nothing  like  an  inclination  to  'extortion  and  plunder'  in  the  coun- 
cils of  the  leading  friends  of  Ireland  in  this  city,  and  nothing  like  a 
suspicion  of  such  baseness  among  the  thousands  who  sustained  and 
cheered  them  in  their  efforts.  All  the  suspicions  and  imputations  to 
which  those  have  been  subjected,  who  freely  gave  their  money  and  their 
exertions  in  aid  of  the  generous  though  ineffectual  effort  for  Ireland's 
liberation,  have  originated  with  those  who  never  gave  that  cause  a  prayer 
or  a  shilling,  and  have  not  yet  travelled  beyond  them. 

"  Respectfully,  HORACE  GREELEY. 

"  New- York,  Nov.  8,  1848." 

Though  Mr.  Greeley  had  many  reasons  which  impelled  him 
to  decidedly  object  to  General  Taylor's  nomination,  and  which 
also  caused  him  to  decline  to  support  the  nomination  for  some 
months  after  it  had  been  made,  yet  may  it  now  be  seen  that 
his  judgment  was  in  errour.  In  after  years  he  ingenuousl^ 
admitted  as  much,  ir  a  "andid  tribute  to  General  Taylor,  when 
he  said: 

"  I  think  I  never  ,aw  General  Ta  lor  save  for  a  moment  at  the  Inaugura- 
tion Ball,  on  the  night  after  his  accession  to  the  Presidency.  I  was  never 
introduced  and  never  wrote  to  him-;  and,  while  I  ultimately  supported 
and  voted  for  him,  I  did  not  hurry  myself  to  secure  his  election.  In  fact, 
that  of  1848  was  my  easiest  and  least  anxious  Presidential  canvass  since 
1324.  When  a  resolve  opposing  the  Wilmot  Proviso  was  laid  on  the  table 
at  the  Convention  that  nominated  him,  I  felt  that  my  zeal,  my  enthusiasm 
for  the  Whig  cause  was  also  laid  there. 

"Yet  I  have  little  faith  in  third-party  movements,  —  which  are  generally 
impelled  by  an  occult  purpose  to  help  one  of  the  leading  parties  by  draw- 
ing off  votes  from  the  other.  General  Taylor  at  length  avowed  himself 'a 
Whig,  but  not  an  ultra  Whig ' ;  and  I  believe  that  was  about  the  literal 
truth.  Zealous  Whigs  apprehended  that  he  might,  if  elected,  shrink  from 
discharging  the  officeholders  appointed  by  Tyler  and  Polk;  but,  after 
giving  him  a  trial,  they  were  constrained  to  admit  that  he 'turned  out 
better  than  had  been  expected.'  He  was  a  man  of  little  education  or 
literary  culture  but  of  signc-i  good  sense,  coolness,  and  freedom  from 


LIFE   OF   HORACE  GKEELEY. 

prejudice.  Few  trained  and  polished  statesmen  have  proved  fitter  deposi- 
taries of  civil  power  than  this  rough  old  soldier,  whose  life  had  been 
largely  passed  in  canip  and  bivouac,  on  the  rude  outskirt  of  civilization, 
or  in  savage  wastes  far  beyond  it.  General  Taylor  died  too  soon  for  his 
country's  good,  but  not  till  he  had  proved  himself  a  wise  and  good  ruler, 
if  not  even  a  great  one."  ' 

This  seems  to  express  agreement  with  the  opinion,  enter- 
tained by  many  persons  at  the  time  familiar  with  the  inside 
history  of  the  conduct  of  public  affiurs,  that  President  Taylor, 
had  he  lived,  would  have  resist"*!  the  encroachments  of  the 
Slave  Power  and  the  obnoxious  portions  of  the  "  Compromise 
measures."  But  not  so  lonp-  as  Henry  Clay  lived,  nor  for 
many  years  after  his  death,  did  Mr.  Greeley  discover  his  mis- 
take of  1848. 

1  Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life,  p.  215. 


CHARLES  A.  DANA.— See  page  130,  etc. 


CHAPTEK   XIII. 

A  MEMBER  OF  CONGRESS. 

Elected  to  Congress  for  "a  Short  Term  "  —  His  Opinion  of  the  Chaplaincy 
• — Land  Reform  —  The  Famous  Congressional  3Iileage  Expose — Aui. 
mated  Debates — Tilt  with  "Long  John"  Wentwortu  on  the  Tariff 
Question  —  A  Lively  Debate  on  Congressional  Books — Speech  on  Re- 
cruiting in  the  Army —  Speeches  on  the  California  and  New  Mexico 
Bills  —  The  Last  Night  of  the  Session  —  "War  Between  the  North  and 
South  Begun" — Some  of  His  Distinguished  Fellow-Members:  Messrs. 
Winthrop;  Lincoln;  Collamer;  Giddings;  Schenck;  Horace  Mann; 
Andrew  Johnson;  Ashniun;  Wentworth;  Cobb;  R.  W.  Thompson; 
Jacob  Thompson ;  George  W.  Jones,  of  Tennessee ;  Stephens ;  Toombs ; 
Botts;  John  S.  Pendleton;  and  others — Address  To  his  Constituents  — 
Congress  Then  and  Now. 

HORACE  GREELEY,  as  we  have  seen,  was  greatly  dissatisfied 
with  the  nomination  of  General  Taylor  as  the  Whig  candidate 
for  President  in  1848.  Pie  was  what  the  virtuous  politicians 
of  the  present  day  would  call  "  a  sore-head;"  a  sore-head  being 
a  person  with  some  ideas  of  his  own,  and  a  man  not  signed, 
sealed,  and  delivered  up  in  fee-simple  to  party.  Mr.  Greeley 
finally  supported  General  Taylor,  however,  and  actually  ran 
for  Congress  on  the  same  ticket  with  him.  This  came  about 
in  this  wise: 

In  the  election  of  1840,  r^cmbers  of  the  Thirtieth  Congress 
beinar  *!:en  chosen,  David  S.  Jackson,  Democrat,  had  been 
returned  from  the  upper  district  of  New- York  city,  beating 
Colonel  James  Monroe,  the  "Whig  candidate,  by  importing  the 
adult  male  paupers  from  the  almshouse  on  Blackwell's  Island — 
"  not  merely  those,"  dryly  says  Mr.  Greeley,  "  who  had  resided 
in  onr  district  before  they  honoured  our  city  by  condescending 
to  live  at  her  expense,  but  those  who  had  been  gathered  in 
from  other  districts."  The  House  of  Representatives,  on 
proof  of  the  fraud,  unseated  Jackson,  but  instead  of  seating 
Colonel  Monroe,  ordered  a  new  election.  But  by  this  time  it 


206  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GKEELET. 

was  far  in  the  year  1848.  Colonel  Monroe  expected  to  be  a 
candidate  for  the  vacancy  and  for  the  Thirty-first  Congress. 
For  the  latter,  however,  the  name  of  James  Brooks  had  been 
engraved  in  large  letters  on  "  the  slate,"  and  the  slate  could 
not  be  broken.  Colonel  Monroe  indignantly  declined  the  nom- 
ination for  "  the  short  term,"  and  it  was  offered  to  Mr.  Greeley. 
He  at  first  resolved  to  decline  "that  fag-end  of  a  term,"  but 
the  nomination  being  most  kindly  pressed  upon  him,  with 
strong  reasons  therefor,  he  accepted  it.  Mr.  Brooks  was  nomi- 
nated for  the  succeeding  Congress.  A  politician  soon  called 
on  Mr.  Greeley,  professing  to  be  from  Mr.  Brooks,  to  inquire 
as  to  what  should  be  done  to  secure  their  election.  "  Tell  Mr. 
Brooks,"  said  Mr.  Greeley,  "  that  we  have  only  to  keep  so  still 
that  no  particular  attention  will  be  called  to  us,  and  General 
Taylor  will  carry  us  both  in."  The  result  verified  the  predic- 
tion, General  Taylor  receiving  in  the  district  11,000  votes,  Mr. 
Greeley  9,932,  and  Mr.  Brooks  9,709.  General  Cass  had  6,826 
votes,  Mr.  Van  Buren  1,681. 

Mr.  Greeley's  district  embraced  all  of  the  city  of  New- York 
above  Fourteenth  street  and  three  wards  lying  below  that  street, 
and  contained  about  one-third  of  the  population  of  the  city. 
Its  boundaries  now  contain  more  than  two-thirds  of  the  popu- 
lation. Soon  after  taking  his  seat,  Mr.  Greeley  introduced  a 
bill  in  the  nature  of  the  homestead  act — successful  not  till  years 
afterwards — and  in  reply  to  a  Western  member  who  wanted  to 
know  why  New  York  should  busy  herself  as  to  the  disposal  of 
the  public  lands,  said  that  his  interest  in  the  matter  was  greatly 
stimulated  by  the  fact  that  he  represented  more  landless  men 
than  any  other  member  on  the  floor.  The  reason  was  regarded 
as  highly  satisfactory,  so  far  as  Mr.  Greeley  was  concerned. 

Mr.  Greeley  took  his  seat  in  the  House  of  Representatives  on 
Monday,  December  4th.  On  the  next  day  he  gave  notice  of  a 
bill  to  discourage  speculation  in  public  lands,  and  to  secure 
homes  thereon  to  actual  settlers  and  cultivators.  Members  and 
Senators  were  slow  in  reaching  the  Capital.  If  one  will  now 
take  up  The  Congressional  Globe  of  that  session  he  will  find 
this  entry  day  after  day:  "Several  other  members  appeared 
this  day  and  took  their  seats'  "  and  in  the  Senate  such  entries 


FIKSTT   HOMESTEAD   BILL.  207 

as  these:  "Mr.  Rusk,  of  Texas,  and  Mr.  Borland,  of  Arkan- 
sas, appeared  in  their  seats  to-day."  "  Mr.  Calhoim,  of  South 
Carolina,  appeared  in  his  place  to-day."  (12th.)  "  Mr.  Douglas. 
— Do  I  understand  the  Chair  that  there  is  no  quorum  present?" 
"The  Chair  replied  that  there  was  no  quorum."  "  Mr.  Doug- 
las.— Then  if  there  is  no  quorum,  I  presume  no  business  is  in 
order."  "  The  Chair  replied4  that  no  business  was  in  order 
until  a  quorum  was  present."  "  On  motion  of  Mr.  Hale  the 
Senate  then  adjourned." 

This  mode  of  proceeding  did  not  strike  Mr.  Greeley  favourably. 
He  thought  that  men  who  were  paid  to  be  in  Washington, 
engaged  in  legislation,  ought  to  be  there  legislating.  He  wrote 
a  letter  to  The  Tribune  upon  the  subject,  which  had  some  vig- 
orous English  in  it.  From  this  letter  it  would  seem  that  he 

O 

neld  the  Congressional  Chaplaincy  in  no  very  exalted  esteem. 
He  says: 

"  On  the  third  day,  the  Senate  did  not  even  succeed  in  forming  a  quorum, 
out  of  fifty-seven  or  eight  members,  who  are  all  sure  to  be  in  for  their  pay 
and  mileage,  only  twenty-nine  appeared  in  their  seats ;  and  the  annual 
hypocrisy  of^elccting  a  chaplain  had  to  go  over  and  waste  another  day.  If 
either  House  liad  a  chaplain  who  dare  preach  to  its  members  what  they 
ought  to  hear — of  their  faithlessness,  their  neglect  of  duty,  their  iniquitous 
waste  of  time,  and  robbery  of  the  public  by  taking  from  the  treasury 
money  which  they  had  not  even  attempted  to  earn — then  there  would  be 
some  sense  in  the  chaplain  business;  but  any  ill-bred  Nathan  or  Elijah 
who  should  undertake  such  a  job  would  be  kicked  out  in  short  order.  So 
the  chaplaincy  remains  a  thing  of  grimace  and  mummery,  nicely  calcu- 
lated to  help  some  flockless  and  complaisant  shepherd  to  a  few  hundred 
dollars,  and  impose  on  devout  simpletons  an  exalted  notion  of  the  piety  of 
Congress.  Should  not  the  truth  be  spoken  ?" 

A  week  after  notice,  Mr.  Greeley  introduced  his  Homestead 
bill,  which  was  referred  to  the  Committee  on  Public  Lands. 
On  the  27th  of  the  following  February  the  Chairman  of  that 
Committee  reported  the  bill  back  to  the  House  without  amend- 
ment which  was  equivalent  to  recommending  no  action  on  the 
measure.  Mr.  Greeley  obtained  the  floor,  and  made  the  fol- 
lowing speech: 

This  is  the  bill  which  I  introduced  at  an  early  day,  upon  notice  given  on 
the  second  day  of  the  session.  It  is  the  only  bill  which  has  been  before  the 


*20S  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

Committee  on  Public  Lands  this  winter,  proposing  to  recognize  in  any  foiaa 
the  principle  that  a  man  is  entitled  to  live  somewliere,  although  he  has  no 
money  wherewith  to  buy  land  to  live  on.  This  bill  asserts  this  principle  in 
the  meekest  and  least  exceptionable  manner.  It  respects  the  pledges  solemnly 
made  of  the  proceeds  of  our  public  lands  to  secure  the  payment  of  our 
Mexican  war  loans.  The  fee  of  every  acre  of  the  public  lands  will 
remain  in  the  United  States,  under  the  provisions  of  this  bill,  until  it  shall 
have  been  purchased  and  paid  for  by  the  holder.  And,  while  it  thus 
guards  the  interests  of  the  whole  country,  it  secures  a  home  to  every  one 
who  will  claim  it,  without  money  and  without  price.  Such  are  the  gen- 
eral characteristics  of  this  bill.  Its  material  provisions  are  as  follows : 

1.  Every  citizen  or  applicant  for  citizenship  is  authorized  by  this  bill 
to  claim  and  settle  upon  any  quarter-section  of  the  public  lands  subject  to 
private  entry  at  the  minimum  price,  receiving  a  certificate  of  right  of  pre- 
emption thereto  for  seven  years  thereafter. 

2.  At  any  time  during  those  seven  years,  upon  giving  due  proof  that  he 
has  improved,  cultivated,  built  a  dwelling  upon,  and  now  actually  inhabits 

.  that  quarter-section,  and  is  the  owner  or  claimant  of  no  other  land  what- 
ever,  he  (or  she)  shall  be  entitled  (if  a  single  person)  to  a  right  of  unlimited 
occupancy  to  forty  acres  of  said  tract,  or  (if  the  married  head  of  a  family) 
to  a  like  right  of  occupancy  to  any  legal  subdivision  of  eighty  acres 
thereof,  to  be  his  without  payment,  and  to  pass  to  his  heirs  or  assigns,  who 
are  owners  or  claimants  of  not  more  than  one  hundred  and  sixty  acres  of 
land,  this  included. 

3.  The  balance  of  the  one  hundred  and  sixty  acres  covered  by  pre- 
emption, as  aforesaid,  may  be  purchased  by  the  legal  occupant  at  any  time 
•within  the  seven  years'  existence  of  the  preemption,  at  the  present  mini- 
mum price  of  one  dollar  and  a  quarter  per  acre,-with  legal  interest  thereon 
from  the  date  of  preemption.    If  not  so  purchased,  it  will  be  open  to  pre- 
emption or  purchase  by  any  other  person,  as  aforesaid. 

4.  Any  person  may  purchase,  at  the  present  legal  minimum,  any  quantity 
of  the  public  lands,  making  affidavit  that  he  requires  the  same,  and  the 
whole  of  it,  for  his  own  use  and  improvement;  but  any  person  failing  or 
neglecting  to  make  and  file  such  affidavit  shall  be  charged,  and  shall  pay, 
for  whatever  land  he  may  buy,  the  minimum  price  of  five  dollars  per  acre. 

Such,  in  substance,  is  the  bill  submitted  by  me,  and  now  before  the 
House,  which  the  Committee  on  Public  Lands  have  reported  to  be  sum- 
marily dismissed.  I  shall  not  tax  the  time  of  the  House  with  any  argument 
in  its  favour,  for  which  there  is  now  no  time.  I  simply  ask  the  yeas  and 
nays  on  the  rejection  of  the  bill.1 

In  view  of  what  has  since  taken  place,  one  would  naturally 
suppose  that  the  bill  and  speech  would  have  met  with  general 
favour.  Here  was  the  origin  of  the  Homestead  act,  now  uni- 
versally acknowledged  as  one  of  the  most  beneficent  measures 

1  Congressional  Globe,  Vol.  20,  p.  605. 


LAND  EEFOBM.  209 

ever  passed  by  Congress.  But  this  bill  was  introduced  in 
1848,  and  by  Horace  Greeley,  a  socialist!  Mr.  Goggin,  of 
Virginia  (and  a  Whig),  after  the  speech,  moved  that  the  l»ill 
be  laid  on  the  table.  Mr.  Greeley  said:  "I  ask  the  yeas  and 
nays  on  that  motion;"  and  even  this  was  denied.  "Only 
about  twenty  members/'  proceedo  The  Globe,  "rising  to 
second  the  call  for  the  yeas  and  naye,  they  were  not  ordered; 
and  the  bill,  by  a  viva  voce  \ote,  was  laid  on  the  table." 

Such  was  the  apparently  humiliating  disaster  which  befell 
Mr.  Greeley's  measure  of  land,  reform.  The  House  went  on 
in  its  usual  hum-drum  fashion,  congratulating  itself  that  a 
"  pestilent  agrarian  "  had  been  fcijenced.  That  was  a  notable 
mistake.  Mr.  Greeley  was  beginning  his  return  match  with 
Mr.  Raymond.  And  was  beaten  again !  But  the  game  is  not 
won  till  it  is  ended.  Soon  we  shall  behold  banners  inscribed 
with  Horace  Greeley's  little  speech  of  February  27,  1849, 
reduced  to  an  apothegm :  "  Lands  for  the  Landless,"  or  it  may 
be,  "Homes  for  the  Homeless."  We  shall  see  a  great  party 
take  it  up  and  gain  invincible  strength  thereby.  We  shall  see 
the  policy  enacted  into  law.  We  shall  see  its  practical  results 
in  the  wonderful  development  of  a  continent,  and  innumerable 
happy  homes.  We  shall  even  see  that  wherein  Horace  Greeley's 
plan  was  departed  from,  in  substantial  principle,  therein  lay 
unwisdom,  and  thence  sprang  gross  abuses,  scandalous  wrongs, 
appalling  corruptions. 

But  we  have  anticipated.  Let  us  return  to  Mr.  Greeley's 
earlier  days  in  Congress  again.  Perhaps  we  ought  to  beg 
pardon  for  having  followed  him  through  this  "wild-goose 
chase"  of  a  Homestead  Law;  this  attempt  to  graft  an  "ism" 
into  national  legislation. 

On  December  18th,  Mr.  Greeley  offered  a  resolution  that 
the  Secretary  of  the  Navy  be  requested  to  inquire  into  and 
report  upon  the  expediency  and  feasibility  of,  temporarily 
employing  the  whole  or  a  portion  of  our  national  vessels  now 
on  the  Pacific  station,  in  the  transportation,  at  moderate  rates, 
of  American  citizens  and  their  effects,  from  Panama  and  the 
Mexican  ports  on  the  Pacific  coast,  to  San  Francisco.  This 
was  during  the  period  of  the  great  migration  to  California, 
li 


210  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

whose  gold  fields  had  recently  been  discovered,  and  Mr. 
Greeley's  object  was,  of  course,  to  aid  the  emigrants  as  much 
as  could  be  done  by  the  general  government.  The  resolution 
laid  over  under  the  rules,  there  being  objection,  but  it  was 
agreed  to  when  called  up  two  days  afterwards.3 

One  of  the  greatest  of  newspaper  "hits"  in  the  history  of 
modern  journalism,  was  an  article  by  Mr.  Greeley  in  The 
Tribune,  in  which  he  made  what  became  known  as  the  famous 
Congressional  Mileage  Expose.  The  expose  appeared  on 
December  22d.  The  portion  of  the  article  which  attracted 
immediate  and  universal  attention  was  a  tabular  statement, 
showing:  1.  The  name  of  each  Representative  in  Congress;  2. 
Actual  distance  from  his  residence  to  Washington  by  the 
shortest  post-route;  3.  Distance  for  which  he  is  paid  mileage; 
4.  Amount  of  mileage  actually  received  by  him ;  and  5.  Excess 
of  mileage  received  over  what  would  have  been  paid,  mileage 
being  computed  by  the  shortest  mail-route.  The  excess  thus 
figured  out  as  having  been  paid  members  of  the  Thirtieth  Con- 
gress made  an  aggregate  of  $73,492.60.  The  excess  of  miles 
travelled  was  183,031,  making  a  distance  something  greater 
than  the  circumference  of  the  earth  seven  times  measured. 
With  very  few  exceptions,  every  Senator  and  Representative, 
was  shown  to  have  travelled  less  or  more  "  circuitous  miles.'' 
It  may  well  be  supposed  that  this  number  of  The  Tribune  was 
eagerly  sought  after.  Every  body  in  New-York  went  to  talking 
on  the  mileage  question.  As  the  paper  reached  the  country, 
the  topic  engaged  some  of  every  one's  attention.  Other  jour- 
nals took  it  up.  In  fine,  the  Congressional  Mileage  Expos6 
stirred  up  a  universal  sensation. 

And  this  sensation  was  greater,  perhaps,  at  Washington, 
and  within  the  Capitol,  than  anywhere  else.  On  the  27th,  an 
excited  debate  upon  the  subject  occurred.  Among  Mr.  Greeley's 
fellow-members  of  the  House  was  Mr.  William  Sawyer,  of 
Ohio,  a  Democrat.  Mr.  Sawyer,  with  some  rural  habits  cling- 
ing to  him  after  he  reached  the  political  metropolis,  had  been 
accustomed  to  take  a  little  lunch  of  crackers  and  "Bologna" 
at  his  desk  in  Representative  Hall,  whereupon  a  reporter  for 

1  The  Congressional  Globe,  Vol.  20,  p.  71. 


THE   MILEAGE   EXPOSE.  211 

The  Tribune,  without  the  fear  of  Sawyer  before  his  eyes,  had 
dubbed  him  "Sausage  Sawyer."  It  was  this  eminent  gentle 
man  who  first  entered  into  the  Mileage  Debate  in  the  House, 
though  there  had  been  a  great  deal  of  energetic  language  used 
by  members  in  private  conversation  previously  to  Mr.  Sawyer's 
starting  the  ball  in  the  Hall.  The  morning  had  been  occupied 
chiefly  with  a  consideration  of  the  subject  of  slavery  in  the 
District  of  Columbia,  when,  that  having  been  disposed  of  for 
the  time  being,  Mr.  Sawyer  "  rose  to  a  question  of  privilege.' 
"  He  supposed,"  he  said,  "  it  would  be  a  question  of  privilege, 
inasmuch  as  it  involved  the  honesty,  the  honour,  and  the 
integrity  of  members  of  this  House,  and  of  himself  among 
the  number."  Mr.  Sawyer's  oratory,  it  will  be  observed,  had 
a  notable  resemblance  to  that  of  Sir  Robert  Ilazlewood,  a 
somewhat  absurd  baronet  in  Scott's  "  Guy  Mannering."  Mr. 
Sawyer  proceeded  to  say  that  "he  referred  to  a  publication 
made  in  The  Tribune  of  the  22d  instant,  relative  to  the  mileage 
of  the  members  of  this  House."  Mr.  Sawyer  figured  in  the 
Expose  with  a  mileage  excess  of  $281.60.  And  he  undertook 
to  show  that  the  object  of  the  expose,  as  to  him,  was  to  place 
him  before  his  constituents  "  in  the  light  [one  might  say  dark- 
ness, rather]  of  having  acted  falsely  and  fraudulently  in  this 
matter."  John  Pettit,  of  Indiana,  who  was  described  by  the 
"Whig  journals  of  that  commonwealth  as  "  the  premium  black- 
guard of  this  State,"  with  a  rudeness  of  expression  only 
pardonable  by  reason  of  its  truth, — John  Pettit  here  interposed, 
as  he  cast  one  eye  up  and  the  other  down,  with  saying,  "  the 
gentleman  need  not  be  disturbed,  for  nobody  who  reads  The 
Triburie  believed  it."  Nevertheless,  Mr.  Sawyer  went  on, 
antil  the  Speaker  interposed,  saying  it  was  quite  obvious  that 
if  one  gentleman  were  allowed  to  proceed  on  this  subject,  as  a 
question  of  privilege,  all  the  members  might  with  equal 
propriety  claim  the  same  right. 

Mr.  Speaker  (Eobert  C.  Winthrop)  began  to  perceive  that 
if  all  those  one  hundred  and  eighty  odd  thousand  miles  of 
"  excess  "  were  to  be  explained  away  on  questions  of  privilege, 
by  abuse  of  Mr.  Greeley,  nothing  else  could  be  done.  But  the 
House  voted  that  it  was  a  question  of  privilege,  and  Mr.  Sawyer 


212  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GREELEY. 

went  on.  He  bravely  determined  "that  neither  a  publication 
which  did  him  so  gross  injustice,  nor  its  author,  should 
escape  that  public  rebuke  which  they  deserved."  At  this 
point  the  lion.  Robert  C.  Schenek  sa'-d.  "he  understood  his 
colleague  as  complaining  that  he  had  been  charged  with 
receiving  a  greater  excess  than  he  (Mr.  Schcnck)  had  done— 
with  receiving  upwards  of  $200  excess,  while  I  was  charged 
to  have  received  only  $2.40."  Mr.  Sawyer  assented.  "Well, 
then,"  said  Mr.  Schenck,  "to  relieve  my  colleague  from  the 
dilemma,  I  will  swap  with  him."  Sawyer  subsided  amid  roars 
of  laughter. 

But  if  Mr.  Sawyer  had  run  down,  Mr.  Thomas  J.  Turner,  a 
Representative  from  Illinois,  had  just  got  himself  well  wound 
up,  and  consequently  "  rose  to  a  question  of  privilege."  This 
gentleman's  "  excess,"  according  to  the  Expose,  was  the  sum 
of  $998.40,  being  only  the  trifle  of  $1.60  less  than  Horace 
Greeley's  annual  salary  on  The  Jeffersonian  newspaper  a  few 
years  before.  Mr.  Turner  was,  therefore,  very  much  in  earnest. 
He  was  interrupted  by  several  gentlemen,  who  explained  that 
members  did  not  charge  their  own  mileage,  but  "the  list,"  as 
published  in  The  Tribune,  had  been  made  up  by  a  committee, 
etc.  Mr.  Turner  then  went  on,  and  having  made  an  uncom- 
monly abusive  speech,  concluded  with  offering  a  series  of  three 
resolutions.  The  first  directed  the  Committee  on  Mileage  to 
inquire  whether  any  member  of  the  House  had  received  more 
mileage  than  he  was  by  law  entitled  to,  and  if  so,  what 
amount.  Also  to  report  by  what  rule  mileage  is  computed, 
by  whom  the  claim  is  allowed,  and  upon  what  evidence.  The 
second  resolution  was  as  follows: 

"Resolved,  That  a  publication  made  in  The  New- York  Tribune  on  the — 
day  of  December,  1848,  in  which  the  mileage  of  members  is  set  forth  and 
commented  on,  be  referred  to  a  Committee,  with  instructions  to  inquire 
into  and  report  whether  said  publication  does  not  amount,  in  substance, 
to  an  allegation  of  fraud  against  most  of  the  members  of  this  House  in 
this  matter  of  their  mileage;  and,  if,  in  the  judgment  of  the  Committee,  it 
does  amount  to  an  allegation  of  fraud,  then  to  inquire  into  it,  and  report 
whether  that  allegation  is  true  or  false." 


T11E   MILEAGE   EXPOSE.  213 

The  tnird  resolve  empowered  the  Committee  to  send  for 
persons  and  -papers. 

Mr.  Turner  demanded  the  previous  question,  but  subse- 
quently withdrew  the  motion.  Whereupon  a  member  from 
Maryland,  by  the  name  of  Alexander  Evans,  renewed  it,  and 
insisted  upon  it,  but  the  House  refused  to  second  it;  and  in 
the  midst  of  a  scene  of  excitement  rarely  equalled  in  the  old 
Hall  of  Representativee,  Mr.  Greeley  proceeded  to  justify  tho 
Expos6.  The  remainder  of  the  debate  is  thus  reported: 

Mr.  Greeley,  after  alluding  (in  a  manner  not  heard  by  the  reporter)  to 
the  comments  that  had  been  made  upon  the  article  in  The  Tribune  relative 
to  the  subject  of  mileage,  and  the  abijyes  which  had  notoriously  been  prac- 
ticed relative  to  it,  said  he  had  heard  no  gentleman  quote  one  word  in  that 
article  imputing  an  illegal  charge  to  any  member  of  this  House,  imputing 
anything  but  a  legel,  proper  charge.  The  whole  ground  of  the  argument 
was  this:  Ought  not  the  law  to  be  changed?  Ought  not  the  mileage  to 
be  settled  by  the  nearest  route,  instead  of  what  was  called  the  usually 
travelled  route,  which  authorized  a  gentleman  coming  from  the  centre  of 
Ohio  to  go  around  by  Sandusky,  Albany,  New-York,  Philadelphia,  and 
Baltimore,  and  to  charge  mileage  upon  that  route.  He  did  not  object  to 
any  gentleman's  taking  that  course  if  he  saw  fit ;  but  was  that  the  route 
upon  which  the  mileage  ought  to  be  computed  ? 

Mr.  Turner  interposed,  and  inquired  if  the  gentleman  wrote  that  article? 

Mr.  Greeley  replied  that  the  introduction  to  the  article  on  mileage  was 
written  by  himself;  the  transcript  from  the  books  of  this  House  and  from 
the  accounts  of  the  Senate  was  made  by  a  reporter,  at  his  direction.  That 
reporter,  who  was  formerly  a  clerk  in  the  Post  Office  Department  (Mr. 
Douglass  Howard),  had  taken  the  latest  book  in  the  department,  which 
contained  the  distances  of  the  several  post  offices  in  the  country  from 
Washington;  and  from  that  book  he  had  got — honestly,  he  knew,  though 
it  might  not  have  been  entirely  accurate  in  an  instance  or  two — the  official 
list  of  the  distances  of  the  several  post  offices  from  this  city.  In  every  case, 
the  post  office  of  the  member,  whether  of  the  Senate  or  the  House,  had  been 
looked  out,  his  distance  as  charged  set  down,  then  the  post  office  book 
referred  to ;  and  the  actual,  honest  distance  by  the  shortest  route  set  down 
opposite,  and  then  the  computation  made  how  much  the  charge  was  an 
excess,  not  of  legal  mileage,  but  of  what  would  be  legal,  if  the  mileage 
was  computed  by  the  nearest  mail  route. 

Mr.  King,  of  Georgia,  desired,  at  this  point  of  the  gentleman's  remarks, 
to  say  a  word :  the  gentleman  said  that  the  members  charged ;  now,  he 
(Mr.  King  desired  to  say,  with  reference  to  himself,  that  from  the  first,  ha 
had  always  refused  to  give  any  information  to  the  Committee  on  Mileaga 
with  respect  to  the  mileage  to  which  he  would  be  entitled.  He  had  told 


214:  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

them  it  was  their  special  duty  to  e«f*Io  the  matter;  that  he  would  have 
nothing  to  do  with  it.  He  therefore  had  charged  nothing. 

Mr.  Greeley  (continuing)  said,  he  thought  all  this  showed  the  necessity 
of  a  new  rule  on  the  subject,  for  here  they  saw  members  shirking  off, 
shrinking  from  the  responsibility,  and  throwing  it  from  one  place  to  an- 
other. Nobody  made  up  the  account,  but  scnichow  an  excess  of  sixty  or 
seventy  thousand  dollars  was  charged  in  the  acoouats  for  mileage,  and  was 
paid  from  the  treasury. 

Mr.  King  interrupted,  and  asked  if  he  meant  to  charge  him  (Mr.  King) 
•with  shirking?  Was  that  the  gentleman's  re~.r.rk? 

Mr.  Greeley  replied,  that  he  only  said  that  by  some  means  or  other,  this 
excess  of  mileage  was  charged,  and  was  paid  by  the  treasury.  This  money 
ought  to  be  saved.  The  same  rule  ou^ht  to  b-3  applied  to  members  of 
Congress  that  was  applied  to  other  parsons. 

Mr.  King  desired  to  auk  the  gentleman  from  New  York  if  he  had  cor- 
rectly understood  his  lau-niage,  for  ho  had  heard  him  indistinctly?  He 
(Mr.  K.)  had  mai-?  the  positive  statemtat  that  he  had  never  had  anything 
to  do  with  reference  to  the  charge  of  his  mileage,  and  he  had  understood 
the  gentleman  from  New  York  to  speak  of  shirking  from  responsibility. 
He  desired  to  know  if  the  gentleman  applied  that  term  to  him? 

Mr.  Greelsy  said  he  had  applied  it  to  no  member. 

Mr.  King  asked,  why  make  use  of  this  term,  then  ? 

Mr.  Greeley's  reply  to  this  interrogatory  was  lost  in  the  confusion  which 
prevailed  in  consequence  of  members  leaving  their  seats  and  coming  for- 
ward to  the  area  in  the  centre. 

The  Speaker  called  the  House  to  order,  and  requested  gentlemen  to  take 
their  seats. 

Mr.  Greeley  proceeded.  There  was  no  intimation  in  the  article  that  any 
member  had  made  out  his  own  account,  but  somehow  or  other  the  accounts 
had  been  so  made  up  as  to  make  a  total  excess  of  some  |60,000  or  $70,000, 
chargeable  upon  the  treasury.  The  general  facts  had  been  stated  to  show 
that  the  law  ought  to  be  different,  and  there  were  several  cases  cited  to 
show  how  the  law  worked  badly;  for  instance,  from  one  district  in  Ohio, 
the  member  formerly  charged  for  four  hundred  miles,  when  he  came  on 
his  own  horse  all  the  way ;  hut  now  the  member  from  the  same  district 
received  mileage  for  some  800  or  900  miles.  Now,  ought  that  to  be  so? 
The  whole  argument  turned  on  this :  now,  the  distances  were  travelled 
much  easier  than  formerly,  and  yet  more,  in  many  cases  much  more,  mile- 
age was  charged.  The  gentleman  from  Ohio  who  commenced  this 
discussion,  had  made  the  point  that  there  was  some  defect,  some  miscalcu- 
lation in  the  estimate  of  distances.  He  could  not  help  it ;  they  had  taken 
the  post  office  books,  and  relied  on  them,  and  if  any  member  of  the  press 
had  picked  out  a  few  members  of  this  House,  and  held  up  their  charges 
for  mileage,  it  would  have  been  considered  invidious. 

Mr.  Turner  called  the  attention  of  the  member  from  New  York  to  the 
fact,  that  the  Postmaster  General  himself  had  thrown  ar/ide  that  post  office 


DEBATE  ON   MILEAGE.  215 

book,  in  consequence  of  its  incorrectness.  He  asked  the  gentleman  if  he 
did  not  know  that  fact? 

Mr.  Greeley  replied,  that  the  article  itself  stated  that  the  department  did 
not  charge  mileage  upon  that  book.  Every  possible  excuse  and  mitigation 
had  been  given  in  the  article ;  but  he  appealed  to  the  House — they  were 
the  masters  of  the  law — why  would  they  not  change  it,  and  make  it  more 
just  and  equal? 

Mr.  Sawyer  wished  to  be  allowed  to  ask  the  gentleman  from  New  York 
a  question.  His  complaint  was,  that  the  article  had  done  him  injustice, 
by  setting  him  down  as  some  300  miles  nearer  the  seat  of  government  than 
his  colleague  (Mr.  Schenck)  was,  although  his  colleague  had  stated  before 
the  House,  that  he  (Mr.  Sawyer)  resided  some  60  or  70  miles  further.  Now, 
he  wanted  to  know  why  the  gentleman  had  made  this  calculation  against 
him,  and  in  favour  of  his  colleague? 

Mr.  Greeley  replied,  that  he  begged  to  assure  the  gentleman  from  Ohio 
that  he  did  not  think  he  had  ever  been  in  his  thoughts  from  the  day  he 
had  come  here  until  the  present  day;  but  he  had  taken  the  figures  from  the 
post  office  book,  as  transcribed  by  a  former  clerk  in  the  Post  Office  Depart- 
ment. 

Mr.  Sawyer  said,  if  the  gentleman  had  been  as  particular  when  he  made 
out  the  statement  as  he  was  now,  he  (Mr.  S.)  would  have  been  saved  this 
trouble.  But  the  article,  whether  intentionally  or  not,  had  done  him  injus- 
tice, and  therefore  he  had  felt  bound  to  call  the  attention  of  the  House  to 
the  fact. 

Some  conversation  (which  was  too  indistinctly  heard,  to  be  minutely 
reported)  here  took  place  between  Mr.  Greeley  and  Mr.  Turner,  with  refer- 
ence to  the  shortest  distance  of  the  latter  gentleman's  residence  from  the 
seat  of  Government;  Mr.  Turner  stating  that  by  an  air-line  the  distance 
was  greater  than  it  had  been  put  down  in  the  newspaper  article  in  ques- 
tion, and  repeating  that  the  only  modes  of  conveyance  from  his  residence 
were  by  the  lakes  or  by  the  rivers,  and  Mr.  Greeley  stating  that  Gen. 
Dodge,  of  Iowa,  who  had  just  taken  his  seat  in  the  Senate,  had  come  by 
another  and  more  direct  route;  to  which  Mr.  Turner  replied  that  Gen. 
Dodge  resided  three  hundred  miles  below  him,  and  consequently  he  could 
take  the  southern  route,  while  he  (Mr.  T.)  could  not. 

Mr.  Greeley  said,  it  must  be  obvious  that  no  gentleman  could  go  around 
inquiring  into  the  mail  routes,  and  guessing  whether  the  distance  of  the 
residence  of  each  member  ought  to  be  computed  as  great  as  it  was  put 
do^vn  in  the  post  office  book.  All  that  he  could  do,  was  to  direct  the 
official  list  to  be  taken ;  he  had  made  no  alteration  in  it. 

He  had  felt  it  his  duty  to  call  the  attention  of  the  House  and  of  the 
country  to  these  abuses  which  existed  in  reference  to  the  allowance  of 
mileage  to  members  of  Congress.  They  were  certainly  gross  abuses,  and 
ought  to  be  corrected.  There  was  no  imputation  in  the  article  upon  any 
member,  that  he  had  made  illegal  charges;  but  arguments  and  facts  had 
been  brought  forward  to  show  the  necessity  of  altering  the  law.' 

•  Congressional  Globe,  Vol.  20,  p  111 


216  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GKEELEY. 

Abraham  Lincoln  moved  for  a  division  of  the  question,  and 
the  iirst  two  resolutions  were  adopted,  the  third  rejected;  when 
the  House  settled  down  into  its  usual  noise  and  confusion,  for 
a  moment,  and  then  adjourned. 

But  this  did  not  end  the  mileage  question.  There  were  two 
or  three  more  "  field-days  "  in  the  House  upon  the  subject.  On 
the  9th  of  January,  1849,  the  Civil  and  Diplomatic  appropria- 
tion bill  being  before  the  House  in  committee  of  the  whole, 
Mr.  Embree,  of  Indiana,  moved  an  amendment  to  the  sum 
appropriated  for  compensation  and  mileage  of  Senators,  Repre- 
sentatives, and  Delegates,  the  following: 

Provided,  That  the  mileage  of  members  of  both  Houses  of  Congress 
shall  hereafter  be  estimated  and  charged  upon  the  shortest  mail  route 
from  their  places  of  residence,  respectively,  to  the  city  of  Washington. 

Hereupon  there  arose  an  excited  debate,  in  which  many 
members  participated,  Mr.  Greeley  receiving  a  great  deal  of 
obloquy.  Mr.  Amos  Tuck,  of  New  Hampshire,  bravely  and 
most  ably  sustained  the  amendment  and  upheld  the  course 
which  had  been  taken  by  Mr.  Greeley.  Mr.  Albert  G.  Brown, 
of  Mississippi,  made  a  bitter  attack  upon  the  writer  of  the 
Expos6,  but  coming  to  close  quarters  with  Mr.  Tuck  was  sud- 
denly placed  hors  de  combat.  Mr.  Brown  was  assailing  the 
gentleman  from  New  Hampshire  upon  another  matter,  when 
Mr.  Tuck  rose  and  requested  the  floor  for  an  explanation.  Mr. 
Brown,  addressing  the  Chair,  said, "  He  is  a  member,  I  believe?" 
Mr.  Tuck  instantly  retorted:  "It  sometimes  happens  that  a 
member  takes  such  a  course  on  this  floor  as  to  put  it  out  of 
liis  power  to  insult  another  member."  Mr.  Brown  dropped 
into  his  seat  as  though  he  had  been  shot,  and  Mr.  Tuck  pro- 
ceeded with  his  explanation.  Mr.  Root,  of  Ohio,  made  a  lively 
speech,  which  kept  the  house  roaring  for  an  hour.  He  was 
opposed  to  Mr.  Embree's  amendment,  and  proposed  to  fix  all 
this  mileage  muddle  up  by  voting  each  member  a  dollar  or  so 
an  hour  while  on  the  journey  to  "Washington!  He  admitted 
that  the  present  rate  of  mileage  was  enough  in  some  instances, 
but  would  never  make  any  man  rich.  One  might  do  very  well 
as  to  mileage,  where  he  could  get  on  a  boat  at  Brownsville  and 


CONGRESSIONAL   MILEAGE.  217 

float  down  the  river  to  the  mouth  of  the  Mississippi.  As  fof 
himself,  he  came  around  by  the  lakes  and  New- York,  because 
that  was  the  most  comfortable  route;  "and  there  is  a  great 
deal  in  this  thing  of  being  comfortable!"  He  also  brought  in 
a  hit  about  "dead-heads,"  which  did  not  happen  to  hit  Mr. 
Greeley,  but  only  a  Pennsylvania  member.  In  replying  to 
Mr.  Greeley's  explanation  on  this  point  Mr.  TJoot  said:  "The 
gentleman  from  New- York  would  do  me  the  justice  to  admit 
that  I  had  intended  no  personalities.  All  knew  how  I  have 
been  drawn  into  this  conversation.  I  had  given  the  gentle- 
man credit  for  eight  dollars  and  a  fip  in  the  omnibus."  Mr. 
Haralson,  of  Georgia,  obtained  the  floor,  by  the  courtesy  of 
Mr.  Embree,  and  moved  that  the  Committee  rise.  Mr.  Gree- 
ley asked  him  to  withhold  the  motion,  that  he  might,  by  the 
courtesy  of  Mr.  Embree,  make  a  brief  reply  to  the  allusions 
which  had  been  made  to  him  and  his  course  upon  this  sub- 
ject. He  asked  only  for  five  minutes.  But  Mr.  Haralson  with 
marked  discourtesy  adhered  to  his  motion,  and  the  Committee 
rose,  reporting  "  no  conclusion." 

Two  days  afterwards  the  subject  came  up  again,  and,  after  a 
speech  by  Mr.  Yenable,  Mr.  Greeley  obtained  the  floor,  and, 
amid  frequent  interruptions  and  unusual  excitement  in  the 
House,  advocated  reform.  Among  those  who  interrupted  him 
in  the  most  insulting  manner  was  Mr.  Turner,  of  Illinois.  To 
one  of  these  interruptions,  Mr.  Greeley  replied  severely : 
"Now  I  shall  use  no  such  language;  it  is  not  used  by  gentle- 
men in  my  section  of  the  country."  Though  constantly 
"  badgered,"  annoyed,  insulted,  Mr.  Greeley  kept  his  temper 
throughout,  and  even  came  off  the  victor  over  Mr.  Schenck  in 
a  contest  of  wits. 

The  following  passages  of  Mr.  Greeley's  speech,  though 
poorly  reported,  will  show  its  general  character: 

Now,  let  him  {Mr.  Greeley)  reply  to  some  of  the  remarks  which  the 
gentleman  from  Mississippi  had  seen  fit  to  apply  to  him  in  the  discussion 
yesterday.  The  gentleman  had  represented  it  as  an  abuse  that  an  editor 
of  a  newspaper  had  a  seat  on  this  floor,  and  that  he  edited  his  paper 
from  here.  He  (Mr.  Greeley)  presumed  he  had  written  less  on  this  floor 
than  most  any  other  gentleman;  certainly  he  had  done  no  editorial 
writing  here.  There  was  time  enough  for  that  out  of  this  House.  And 


218  *  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GREELET. 

besides  attending  to  bis  duties  on  this  floor  and  in  the  Committee  -room, 
lie  had  been  absent  but  one  day,  and  that  a  private-bill  day,  and  a  short 
session;  and  the  chairman  of  the  Committee  on  the  Public  Lands,  of 
•which  he  was  a  member,  would  tell  the  gentleman  that  he  (Mr.  G.)  had 
not  been  absent  from  the  meetings  of  that  Committee,  and  that  he  had 
sought,  rather  than  shunned,  labour  on  that  Committee.  He  believed  the 
gentleman  from  Mississippi  would  find  he  (Mr.  G.)  would  be  disposed  to 
do  as  much  on  this  floor,  or  off  of  it,  of  his  duties  as  a  member  of  this 
House,  as  the  gentleman  would  deem  desirable.  Now,  what  was  the 
abuse!  That  he  was  the  editor  of  a  newspaper,  was  certainly  true.  That 
he  had  given  awny  the  time  of  the  public  to  editing  his  paper,  was  not 
true.  Here  were  lawyers  who  left  their  seats  in  this  Hall  for  two  or  three 
weeks  together,  to  attend  to  their  practice.  Of  this  he  did  not  complain ; 
he  did  not  do  it;  he  should  devote  his  time  to  the  discharge  of  the  duties 
incumbent  upon  him,  for  the  brief  time  he  had  to  serve  here. 

Now,  as  to  this  matter  of  the  reform  of  mileage :  Every  gentleman  who 
had  spoken  had  admitted  that  the  present  system  was  wrong;  that  there 
ought  to  be  some  change.  Almost  every  one  suggested  some  amendment. 
If  the  present  amount  paid  was  just,  it  ought  to  be  more  fairly  distributed. 
He  said  it  was  unjust.  But  this  was  a  beggarly  sum.  It  was  only  some 
sixty  or  seventy  thousand  dollars'  saving.  Did  you  ever  know  of  reform, 
of  retrenchment,  that  was  not  beggarly?  Retrenchment  was  always  a 
beggarly  business ;  it  was  not  a  business  for  a  gentleman.  Gentlemanly 
instincts  shunned  it  as  a  rather  low  business  —  as  rather  discreditable, 
even  for  editors.  Reform  when  you  will,  it  is  always  strike  higher  or 
lower,  or  it  is  something  else  that  is  to  be  amended  —  an  entirely  different 
thing  from  that  which  you  are  attempting  to  do.  The  country  would 
understand  this;  he  was  entirely  sure  this  House  did  understand  it.  It 
•was  the  way,  the  gentlemanly  way,  never  to  mind  the  expense;  go  it 
lavishly;  divide,  distribute  to  your  friends  even  if  you  go  ashore;  run  in 
debt,  repudiate,  curse  your  creditors  as  descended  from  Judas  Iscariot 
But  he  was  not  rocked  in  the  cradle  of  gentility. 

*  *  *  *  ****** 

He  believed  that  this  was  a  matter  demanding  the  attention  of  the 
House.  He  believed,  that  if  they  should  begin  by  first  making  a  reform 
which  touched  their  own  pockets,  the  natural  effect  would  be  to  lead  to 
other  reforms;  and  these  proper  and  judicious  reforms  being  effected, 
the  confidence  of  the  country  in  this  House  would  be  increased,  and  the 
power  of  this  House  to  do  good  immensely  enhanced.  He  believed  it  was 
desirable  in  every  way,  that  it  would  strengthen  the  confidence  of  the 
people  in  the  Government,  and  lead  them  to  feel  that  it  was  an  equitable, 
a  just  Government;  that  they  were  assembled  here  to  do  justice  to  them- 
selves  and  to  every  one  else;  that  they  would  correct  abuses  which  affected 
their  own  pockets.  He  knew  not  whether,  under  the  Constitution,  this 
reduction  of  mileage  could  be  made  to  apply  to  the  present  Congress  :  if 
it  could,  so  much  the  better.4 

4  The  Congressional  Globe,  vol.  20,  p.  320. 


"BATTLE  OF  THE  BOOKS."  210 

It  is  worthy  of  remark  that  the  rage  manifested  against  Mr. 
Greeley  by  the  members  of  the  House  was  generally  in  pro- 
portion to  their  "  excess  "  of  mileage.  The  reform  of  the  law 
which  he  had  in  view  was  defeated,  but  u  the  usual  routes  of 
travel "  were  henceforth  very  much  less  "  circuitous "  than 
they  had  been,  and  some  years  afterwards  the  rate  of  mileage 
was  reduced  fifty  per  cent.,  and  constructive  mileage  utterly 
prohibited.  A  long,  long  range  had  Mr.  Greeley's  gun,  but  it 
hit  the  target  at  last. 

Meantime,  however,  Mr.  Greeley  paid  attention  to  a  great 
many  things  besides  that  which  had  brought  forth  so  much 
crimination  and  recrimination.  Some  time  before  the  holidays 
he  had  introduced  a  resolution  calling  upon  the  Secretary 
of  the  Treasury  to  communicate  to  the  House  the  considera- 
tions of  equity  or  public  policy  which  justify  the  assessment 
by  the  tariff  of  1846,  on  woollen  blankets,  flannels,  blaizes, 
etc.,  and  on  hempen  cables,  cordage,  and  several  other  descrip- 
tions of  imported  manufactures  of  rates  of  duty  five  to  ten 
per  cent,  lower  than  are  charged  on  the  principal  raw  material 
from  which-they  are  respectively  fabricated;  and  if  the  same 
be  not  justified  as  aforesaid,  what  action  of  Congress  in  relation 
thereto  is  deemed  by  him  desirable.  The  consideration  of  this 
resolution  came  up  early  in  January,  and  Mr.  Wentworth,  of 
Illinois,  proceeded  to  say  with  much  force  that  Congress  had 
passed  the  tariff  .act  of  1846,  and  with  characteristic  straight- 
forwardness that  he  "  had  had  as  much  to  do  with  passing  that 
law  as  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  had  had."  A  quite 
animated  debate  between  Mr.  Wentworth  and  Mr.  Greeley  fol 
lowed,  and  Mr.  Wentworth's  motion  to  lay  the  resolution  on 
the  table  was  at  first  defeated  by  a  majority  of  one  vote,  but 
afterwards  prevailed.  Mr.  Greeley  appears  to  have  gained  the 
point  he  aimed  at,  however,  namely,  to  show  that  the  tariff  of 
1846  had  been  mainly  dictated  to  Congress  by  the  Secretary 
of  the  Treasury.  And  herein  he  was  handsomely  assisted  by 
his  friend  and  colleague,  Mr.  Washington  Hunt. 

On  the  23d  of  January  occurred  the  famous  "  Battle  of  the 
Books,"  making  even  a  more  exciting  debate  than  any  called 
forth  by  the  Congressional  Mileage  Expose.  For  two  hours 


220  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

the  Hall  was  u  scene  of  excitement  which  was  never  equalled 
except  upon  some  occasions  when  the  discussion  of  the  slavery 
question  converted  the  House  into  a  mob  of  vociferous,  angry, 
unreasonable  men,  many  of  them  anxious  for  personal  ren- 
contres. In  this  Battle  of  the  Books,  though  Mr.  Greeley 
was  most  unexpectedly  assailed  by  a  member  whom  he  had 
regarded  as  his  friend,  and  though  many  of  the  members 
heartily  hated  him  on  account  of  his  exposure  of  their  mileage 
ways  that  were  dark  and  tricks  that  were  vain,  yet  did  he  bear 
himself  throughout  the  fierce  conflict  with  imperturbable  cool- 
ness; and  repelled  the  premeditated,  cunningly-devised,  and 
malicious  assault  in  such  way  as  must  have  left  its  originators 
blistering  and  burning  with  shame  for  many  a  day. 

The  House  being  in  Committee  of  the  Whole  (the  Hon. 
Caleb  B.  Smith,  of  Indiana,  in  the  Chair),  on  the  General 
Appropriation  Bill,  had  considered  a  variety  of  subjects,  and 
was  about  to  rise,  when  Mr.  Edwards,  of  Ohio,  moved  an 
amendment  (eham)  to  the  effect  that  the  sums  of  money  appro- 
priated in  the  bills  for  books  be  deducted  from  the  pay  of 
members  voting  for  the  appropriation.  He  then  read  a  brief 
report  from  The  Tribune  of  a  speech  made  a  few  days  before 
by  Mr.  Greeley,  in  which  he  denied  that  he  had  voted  for  the 
appropriation  for  the  books.  Mr.  Edwards  now  undertook  to 
browbeat  Mr.  Greeley,  and  to  involve  him  in  humiliating 
contradiction.  After  considerable  sparring,  he  said:  "I  under- 
stand, then,  that  the  gentleman  from  New  York  voted  without 
understanding  what  he  was  voting  upon,  and  that  he  would 
have  voted  against  taking  the  books  had  he  not  been  mis- 
taken." To  this  Mr.  Greeley  assented.  "I  assert,"  responded 
Mr.  Edwards,  "  that  that  declaration  is  unfounded  in  fact.  I 
have  the  proof  that  the  gentleman  justified  his  vote  both  before 
and  after  the  voting."  The  House  now  became  deeply  inter- 
ested and  rapidly  grew  into  a  paroxysm  of  excitement.  Mem- 
bers were  sure  that  at  last  the  Great  Exposer  was  going  to  be 
himself  exposed  in  no  desirable  plight.  There  had  indeed 
been  an  informal  meeting  of  members  of  very  circuitous  routes 
of  travel,  who  considered  the  propriety  of  a  movement  to 


"BATTLE  OF  THE  BOOKS."  221 

expel  the  audacious  originator  of  the  great  popular  indigna- 
tion. Upon  a  shrewd  suggestion  from  Mr.  Wentworth,  "  that 
that  thing  would  make  Horace  Greeley  President,"  the  expul- 
sion plan  was  abandoned.  So  now  members  gathered  around 
Mr.  Edwards,  urging  him  to  name  his  witnesses.  He  named 
three  members  of  the  House.  And  then  Mr.  Yinton,  Chairman 
of  the  Ways  and  Means  Committee,  made  a  statement  as  to 
how  the  appropriation  had  been  made,  which  brought  about 
comparative  calm.  Mr.  Greeley  followed,  asking  that  the 
members  called  upon  might  make  their  statements.  They  did 
so,  two  of  them  apparently  sustaining  Mr.  Edwards,  the  other 
not.  Mr.  Edwards  then  justified  his  vote  on  reasons  similar 
to  those  which,  he  said,  justified  Mr.  Greeley 's  vote;  and  then 
launched  into  the  "circuitous  route!"  He  was  stopped  by  the 
Chairman,  and  Mr.  Greeley  explained  the  mistake  that  had 
been  made,  but  stated  that  he  had  before,  and  now  approved 
the  appropriation.  "Why,  then,"  asked  Mr.  Edwards,  "did 
you  make  the  denial  in  The  Tribune,  and  say  that  you  voted 
against  it?"  "I  did  vote  against  it,"  said  Mr.  Greeley.  "I 
did  not  vote"  for  it,  because  I  did  not  choose  to  have  some  sort 
of  gentlemen  on  this  floor  hawk  at  me."  Mr.  Edwards  was  one 
of  the  sort  of  gentlemen  who  did  not  hawk  at  him  any 
more. 

On  the  25th,  two  days  after  the  book  war,  Mr.  Greeley  made 
an  earnest  speech  in  attack  of  the  cruelties  practiced  in  the 
recruiting  service,  and  in  favour  of  a  reduction  of  the  expendi- 
tures for  the  army.  A  few  days  afterwards  he  also  spoke  in 
advocacy  of  retrenchment  in  the  navy.  But  the  only  speech 
by  him,  which  was  fully  reported,  was  that  delivered  on  Febru- 
ary 26th,  on  the  bill  to  provide  a  Territorial  Government  for 
California.  On  the  following  day  he  made  a  speech  on  the 
bill  organizing  New  Mexico  as  a  Territory,  which  was  reported 
with  tolerable  fullness.  He  offered  an  amendment  to  one  of 
these  bills,  and,  speaking  in  advocacy  thereof,  was  interrupted 
by  Mr.  Kaufman,  of  Texas,  who,  with  that  singular  courtesy  so 
often  extended  to  Mr.  Greeley,  "wished  to  inquire  of  the  gen- 
tleman from  New  York  whether,  by  the  introduction  of  the 


222  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

amendment  which  he  had  offered,  he  wanted  to  steal  from 
Texas  land  enough  for  his  Fourierite  bill  to  operate  upon?" 
Whereupon  Mr.  Greeley  said:  "I  do  not  think  it  becomes  the 
Representative  from  Texas  to  talk  about  land-stealing."  And 
Mr.  Kaufman  dropped  the  subject. 

Mr.  Greeley  was  a  constant  attendant  upon  the  sessions  of 
the  House;  a  conscientious  worker  both  in  the  Hall  and  Ccai- 
mittee-room.  He  did  all  that  one  man  could  to  conduct 
legislative  business  with  dispatch  and  efficiency.  He  often 
demanded  the  yeas  and  nays  on  motions  to  udjourn  over,  and 
called  general  attention  to  the  waste  of  tie^e  which  was  con- 
stantly going  on.  Almost  every  day  he  i/itroduced  petitions 
"for  cheap  postage  and  no  franking;"  for  the  reform  of  the 
mileage  abuse;  for  other  measures,  then  unpopular,  fairly 
odious  in  the  House,  now,  many  of  them,  incorporated  into  the 
settled  policy  of  the  Republic.  It  may  well  be  concluded  that 
he  was  a  thorn  in  the  side  of  the  "  o*J  soldier  "  Representa- 
tive. He  was  perpetually  stirring  ap  thinge  a  knowledge 
whereof  did  not  redound  to  the  credit  of  many  of  those  "  old 
soldiers  "  as  men  of  honour  or  statesmen  of  capacity.  Besides 
his  speeches  on  the  tariff  question,  and  other  topics  of  general 
interest,  he  inaugurated  the  reform  of  mileage;  cheap  postage; 
abolition  of  the  franking  privilege;  the  policy  of  free  home- 
steads to  actual  settlers,  his  despised  "Fourierite  bill," — 
receiving  his  vote  alone, — becoming  the  most  popular  law  of 
the  land.  If  the  ripe  harvest  of  the  seeds  sown  by  Horace 
Greeley  during  his  brief  membership  of  the  House  of  Repre- 
sentatives be  estimated  as  the  fruit  of  his  statesmanship,  it 
might  justly  be  claimed  that  he  accomplished  as  much  in  a 
single  short  session  as  not  a  few  of  the  most  eminent  of  our 
public  men  have  been  able  to  accomplish  in  a  lifetime.  After 
his  membership,  no  more  journeys  to  Congress  by  way  of  Good 
Hope!  Cheap  postage  soon  followed.  Lands  for  the  landless 
became  the  fixed  policy  of  the  nation.  And  now,  in  the 
administration  of  President  Grant,  Horace  Greeley's  "pet 
reform  "  against  franking,  is  accomplished. 

Mr.  Greeley's  last  night  in  Congress  was,  as  is  usual,  one  of 
uproar,  and  attempts  to  carry  questionable  measures,  too  often 


A   LAST  NIGHT  OF   CONGRESS.  223 

resulting  in  success,  as  was  the  case  on  this  memorable  night, 
notwithstanding  his  exertions  against  the  allowance  of  expen 
sive  perquisites.  But  the  disturbance  on  this  occasion  came 
near  amounting  to  "a  free  fight."  Mr.  Greeley  gives  his 
recollections  of  this  last  night  of  the  Thirtieth  Congress  in 
these  words : 

"The  last  night  of  a  session  is  usually  a  long  one;  and  ours  was  not 
only  long,  but  excited.  The  two  Houses  were  at  variance :  The  House 
desiring  (at  least,  voting)  to  prohibit  the  introduction  of  Slavery  into  the 
vast  territories  just  then  acquired  from  Mexico ;  the  Senate  dissenting  from 
that  policy.  Of  course,  we  who  voted  for  the  restriction  could  not  carry 
it  through  nor  over  the  Senate.  But  that  body  was  not  content  to  stand 
on  the  defensive ;  it  attached  to  the  great  Civil  and  Diplomatic  Appropri- 
ation  bill  (since  divided)  a  provision  for  the  organization  of  the  new 
Territories,  —  of  course,  without  the  restriction  against  Slavery,  —  and,  in 
effect,  said  to  us,  'You  shall  agree  to  this,  or  the  new  [Taylor]  Adminis- 
tration shall  not  have  a  dollar  to  spend  after  the  1st  of  July  ensuing.'  We 
had  one  or  two  conferences  by  committee ;  but  neither  House  would  give 
way.  Finally,  the  bill  came  back  to  us  on  this  last  evening,  —  the  Senate 
insisting  on  its  Territorial  amendment.  Each  side  had  rallied  in  full  force 
(there  were  but  three  of  all  the  representatives  chosen  from  the  Slave  States 
who  were  not  in  their  seats),  and  we  were  morally  certain  to  be  beaten 
on  a  motion  to  recede, — three  or  four  weak  brethren  changing  their  votes 
rather  than  leave  the  Government  penniless ;  when  some  one  on  our  side  — 
I  believe  it  was  Richard  W.  Thompson  of  Indiana  —  got  in  a  motion  to 
concur,  with  an  amendment.  This  amendment  accepted  the  Senate's  project 
of  organizing  the  new  Territories,  barely  adding  a  stipulation  that  tht 
existing  laws  thereof  should  remain  in  force  till  changed  by  consent  of  Con- 
gress. (The  existing  laws  were  those  of  Mexico,  and  forbade  Slavery.) 
This  motion  prevailed  (as  I  recollect  the  vote  on  one  important  division 
stood  one  hundred  and  eleven  to  one  hundred  and  ten),  and  completely 
changed  the  whole  aspect  of  the  matter.  The  pro-Slavery  men  were  now 
as  anxious  to  expunge  the  Territorial  clause  as  they  had  previously  been 
determined  to  insert  it  at  all  hazards ;  and  the  Senate  struck  out  its  cher- 
ished provision,  and  let  the  Appropriation  bill  pass  as  it  originally  was, 
leaving  the  question  of  Slavery  in  the  new  Territories  as  a  legacy  of  trouble 
to  the  incoming  Administration.  Never  was  a  parliamentary  move  more 
clever  than  that  motion  to  concur,  with  an  amendment. 

When  it  had  been  carried  through  our  House,  and  while  the  Senate  waa 
chewing  upon  it,  there  ensued  a  hiatus  or  interregnum,  —  the  House  having 
really  nothing  to  do  but  wait.  At  such  times,  any  member  who  has  a  pet 
project  or  bill  asks  a  suspension  of  the  rules  in  favour  of  its  consideration. 
Among  these  motions  was  one  by  Mr.  Robert  W.  Johnson  of  Arkansas, 
who  wished  the  House  to  consider  a  bill  providing  payment  for  horses  lost 
by  his  constituents  while  acting  as  volunteers  in  Indian  wars.  His  motion 


22-t  LIFE  OF   HORACE  OKEELEY. 

to  suspend  the  rules  failed;  when  I  drew  from  my  drawer  a  resolve,  which 
had  lain  there  for  weeks,  proposing  that  our  country  take  the  general 
name  of  COLUMBIA,  in  honour  of  the  great  discoverer.  I  was  making  a  few 
remarks  introductory  to  my  motion  to  suspend  the  rules,  —  which  I  knew 
would  be  defeated, — when,  as  the  affair  was  afterward  explained  tome, 
Mr.  Johnson  turned  upon  Mr.  O.  B.  Ficklin  of  Illinois,  who  sat  very  near 
him,  and  angrily  said :  '  Ficklin,  why  do  you  always  oppose  any  motion 
I  make ?'  'I  did  not  oppose  your  motion,'  was  the  prompt  and  true 
reply.  'You  lie,'  rejoined  Johnson,  whose  powers  of  observation  were 
not  then  in  their  best  estate,  and  he  sprang  forward  as  though  to  clutch 
Ficklin ;  when  Mr.  Samuel  W.  Inge  of  Alabama,  rushed  upon  the  latter, 
and  struck  him  two  or  three  blows  with  a  cane.  'Order!  Order!  —  Ser- 
geant-at-arms,  do  your  duty !'  interposed  the  Speaker ;  and  the  affray  was 
promptly  arrested.  'Why,  Inge,  what  did  you  fall  upon  Ficklin  for?' 
inquired  one  of  his  neighbours;  Ficklin  being  an  intensely  pro-Slavery 
Democrat,  as  were  Inge  and  Johnson.  '  Why,  I  thought,'  explained  Inge, 
4  that  the  fight  between  the  North  and  the  South  had  commenced,  and  I 
might  as  well  pitch  in.'  I  did  not  hear  him  say  this;  but  it  was  reported 
to  me  directly  afterward,  and  I  have  no  doubt  that  he  said  and  thought  so. 

"  Mr.  Giddings  went  over  to  the  Democratic  side  of  the  House  that 
night,  and  made  some  jocular  remark  to  an  acquaintance  on  the  change 
of  aspect  since  we  had  made  and  sustained  our  motion  to  concur,  with  an 
amendment, — when  he  was  assaulted,  and  was  glad  to  get  away  quite 
rapidly.  I  am  confident  I  could  not  have  passed  quietly  through  that  side 
of  the  House  between  ten  and  two  o'clock  of  that  night  without  being 
assaulted;  and,  had  I  resisted,  beaten  within  an  inch  of  my  life,  if  not 
killed  outright  Yet  I  had  proposed  nothing,  said  nothing,  on  the  exciting 
topic ;  I  was  obnoxious  only  because  I  was  presumed  earnestly  hostile  to 
Slavery. 

"  I  believe  it  was  just  7  A.  M.  of  the  4th  of  March,  1849, — the  day  of 
General  Taylor's  inauguration, — when  the  two  Houses,  having  finished 
all  the  inevitable  business  of  the  session,  were  adjourned  without  day,  and 
I  walked  down  to  my  hotel,  free  thenceforth  to  mind  my  own  business.  I 
have  not  since  been  a  member,  nor  held  any  post  under  the  Federal  Gov- 
ernment; it  is  not  likely  that  I  shall  ever  again  hold  one;  yet  I  look  hack 
upon  those  three  months  I  spent  in  Congress  as  among  the  most  profitably 
employed  of  any  in  the  course  of  my  life.  I  saw  things  from  a  novel 
point  of  view ;  and,  if  I  came  away  from  the  Capitol  no  wiser  than  I 
went  thither,  the  fault  was  entirely  my  own."  • 

The  Congress  in  which  Horace  Greeley  thus  served  for  the 
brief  period  of  three  months  contained  many  distinguished 
men  in  either  branch.  Webster,  Calhoun,  Clayton,  Benton, 
Corwin,  Douglas,  and  others  of  illustrious  name  were  in  the 
Senate.  Mr.  Greeley,  however,  was  so  constant  in  his  attend 

•  Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life,  pp.  231-32. 


JOSHUA   R.    GIDDINGS.  225 

ancc  npon  the  House  that  he  saw  little  of  the  Senate.  Robert 
C.  "\Vinthrop,  of  Massachusetts,  was  the  Speaker,  —  a  gentle- 
man of  acknowledged  ability,  rare  culture,  imposing  presence. 
Few  men  have  occupied  the  presiding  chair  of  the  boisterous 
House  with  greater  dignity  or  greater  credit.  Abraham 
Lincoln,  of  Illinois,  afterwards  the  illustrious  President,  was  a 
member  and  specially  friendly  with  Mr.  Greeley.  Mr.  Lincoln 
seemed,  said  Mr.  Greeley,  "a  quiet,  good-natured  man,  did  not 
aspire  to  leadership,  and  seldom  claimed  the  floor.  I  think  he 
made  but  one  set  speech  during  that  session,  and  this  speech 
was  by  no  means  a  long  one.  Though  a  strong  partizan,  he 
voted  against  the  bulk  of  his  party  once  or  twice,  when  that 
course  was  dictated  by  his  convictions.  He  was  one  of  the 
most  moderate,  though  firm,  opponents  of  Slavery  Extension, 
and  notably  of  a  buoyant,  cheerful  spirit.  It  will  surprise 
some  to  hear  that,  though  I  was  often  in  his  company  thence- 
forward till  his  death,  and  long  on  terms  of  friendly  intimacy 
with  him,  I  never  heard  him  tell  an  anecdote  or  story." 

Mr.  Greeley  was  appointed  a  member  of  the  Committee  on 
Public  Lands,  "of  which  the  Hon.  Jacob  Collamer,  of  Yermont, 
was  Chairman.  Mr.  Collamer  was  then  as  ever  fully  entitled 
to  "  the  grand  old  name  of  gentleman."  Of  a  generous,  chiv- 
alric  nature,  firm  in  his  own  opinions,  most  respectful  of  the 
opinions  of  others;  with  a  fine  presence  and  fascinating  con- 
versational powers,  he  was  as  admirably  adapted  to  receive  the 
respect  of  man  and  the  love  of  woman  as  almost  any  of  his 
cotemporaries  among  public  men.  He  rose  to  great  distinc- 
tion in  the  republic,  being  highly  successful  and  celebrated 
both  in  the  executive  and  legislative  branches  of  government, 
but  it  was  as  a  companion  in  quiet  conversation  that  he  won 
the  deepest  aflectio*n  of  those  who  knew  him  best. 

Joshua  E.  Giddings,  of  Ohio,  since  the  then  recent  death  of 
John  Quincy  Adams,  was  the  most  noted  champion  of  anti- 
Slavery  in  the  House;  and  anti-Slavery  had  not  yet  begun  to 
be  popular.  Mr.  Giddings  was  an  agitator,  and  he  long  ap- 
peared to  the  public,  quite  generally  opposed  to  the  agitation 
of  the  subject  of  slavery,  as  an  exceedingly  unamiable  and 
rather  disreputable  character.  On  the  contrary,  he  was  a  per- 
15 


226  LIFE   OF  HOKACE   GRKELEY. 

eon  of  an  unusually  large  and  warm  heart,  and  of  refined 
feelings.  He  and  Mr,  Greeley  were  great  friends  from  the 
beginning.  Mr.  Giddings,  however,  was  fond  of  some  amuse- 
ments and  pleasures,  deemed  innocent  by  himself  and  most 
men,  for  which  Mr.  Greeley  had  neither  time  nor  inclination. 
"  Sundry  attempts  at  reforming  what  were  considered  abuses," 
says  Mr.  Greeley,  "were  made  that  Winter,  but  without  bril- 
liant success.  We  tried  to  abolish  flogging  in  the  Navy,  but 
were  beaten.  I  think  it  was  Mr.  (now  General)  Schenck  who 
raised  a  laugh  against  us  by  proposing  so  to  amend  that  the  com- 
mander of  a  ship  of  war  should  never  order  a  sail  spread  or 
reefed  without  calling  all  hands  and  taking  a  vote  of  his  crew 
on  the  question.  We  were  temporarily  successful  in  voting  in 
Committee  to  stop  dealing  out  strong  drink  to  the  sailors  and 
marines  in  our  Navy,  though  this,  too,  was  ultimately  defeated; 
but,  iu  the  first  flush  of  our  delusive  triumph,  a  member  sitting 
near  me,  who  had  voted  to  stop  the  grog  ration,  said  to  a 
friend  who  (I  believe)  had  voted  the  same  way,  — '  Gid,  that 
was  a  glorious  vote  we  have  just  taken.'  *  Yes,  glorious,'  was 
the  ready  response.  *  Gid,'  resumed  the  elated  reformer,  '  let 
us  go  and  take  a  drink  on  the  strength  of  it.'  'Agreed,'  was 
the  willing  echo ;  and  they  went." 

Robert  C.  Schenck,  here  referred  to,  since  celebrated  as  a 
general  and  diplomatist,  was  at  this  time  in  the  prime  of  his 
manhood.  He  had  a  robust  frame,  a  powerful  voice,  and 
magnificent  pluck.  He  was  an  orator  of  great  powers  of  per- 
suasion, and  one  of  the  keenest,  most  brilliant  disputants  of 
the  House  in  a  running  debate.  Of  great  good-nature  ordi- 
narily, he  was  capable  of  as  daring  flights  of  wrath  as  of 
eloquence;  but  humour  predominated  in  his  mind  when  not 
aroused,  and,  next  to  his  colleague  in  this  House,  Mr.  Joseph 
M.  Hoot,  of  the  Cleveland  district,  Mr.  Schenck  was  chargeable 
with  more  of  the  wit  of  the  session  than  almost  any  other 
member. 

If  Mr.  Schenck  were  an  admirable  specimen  of  Western 
vigour,  dash,  and  parliamentary  ability,  taking  captive  Mr. 
Greeley's  hearty  admiration,  he  found  in  the  captivating  gen- 
tlemanliness  and  ripe  scholarship  of  Horace  Mann,  of  Massa- 


FELLOW-MEMBERS   OF   CONGRESS.  227 

ehusetts,  qualities  which  won  his  devoted  friendship  no  less 
effectively.  As  Congress  was  then  constituted,  and  as  it  still 
is  constituted, — the  more's  the  pity, — Horace  Mann  was  there 
out  of  his  element. 

Among  the  members  of  the  opposition,  Andrew  Johnson, 
of  Tennessee,  afterwards  President  of  the  United  States,  became 
as  well  known  as  any  other  to  Mr.  Greeley.  Mr.  Johnson  at 
this  time  had  not  won  wide  distinction;  but  he  was  recognized 
in  the  House  as  a  man  of  strong  mind  and  strong  will,  and 
none  who  knew  him  then,  or  ever  afterwards,  doubted  his 
manly  and  unpurchasable  personal  integrity. 

George  Ashmun,  of  Massachusetts,  was  then  among  New 
England's  most  eminent  Representatives.  He  presided  over 
the  convention  which,  twelve  years  afterwards,  nominated 
Abraham  Lincoln  for  the  Presidency.  A  more  admirable, 
efficient  presiding  officer  but  few  deliberative  bodies  have  ever 
been  fortunate  enough  to  select.  Here,  too,  as  we  have  already 
seen,  was  John  Wentworth,  of  Illinois,  then  of  the  Democratic 
party.  Gigantic  in  form,  he  was  universally  called  "Long 
John,"  and  retains  the  designation  to  this  day.  A  skilful 
debater,  an  able  parliamentarian,  he  was  better  liked  by  Mr. 
Greeley  than  any  other  one  of  the  opposition.  Here  also  Mr. 
Greeley  daily  met  Howell  Cobb,  of  Georgia,  Jacob  Thompson, 
of  Mississippi,  Alexander  H.  Stephens,  of  Georgia,  Robert 
Toombs,  of  the  same  State — note.d  Southerners  then,  more 
noted  afterwards  as  prominent  leaders  in  the  war  of  the  rebel- 
lion against  the  Union.  Richard  W.  Thompson,  of  Indiana, 
and  George  W.  Jones,  of  Tennessee,  impressed  Mr.  Greeley  as 
among  the  most  effective  speakers  pf  the  House.  He  thought 
John  S.  Pendleton,  of  Virginia,  a  splendid  specimen  of  the 
Southern  gentleman,  but  no  finer  than  Abraham  W.  Yenable, 
of  North  Carolina.  Mr.  R.  Barnwell  Rhett  was  a  member  of 
the  House,  but  already  too  much  of  a  "  fire-eater  "  to  be  received 
with  marked  hospitality  by  the  editor  of  The  Tribune.  He 
greatly  liked  Green  Adams,  of  Kentucky,  and  John  M.  Botts, 
of  Virginia,  both  of  whom  became  somewhat  celebrated  in  poli- 
tics, the  latter  having  already,  indeed,  a  national  reputation. 
James  Dixon  and  Truman  Smith  were  in  the  House  from  Con- 


228  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

necticnt,  both  afterwards  many  years  in  the  Senate.  Of  his 
own  colleagues,  Washington  Hunt  and  Frederick  A.  Tallmadge 
were  the  most  distinguished. 

On  the  evening  of  March  6th,  Mr.  Greeley,  in  full  dress, 
attended  the  Inauguration  Ball,  which  he  perceived  was  "  a 
eweaty,  seething,  sweltering  jam,  a  crowd  of  duped  foregather- 
ers  from  all  creation."  In  his  letter  to  the  Tribune,  he  thus 
speaks  of  the  ball,  of  the  new  President,  General  Taylor,  and 
of  Henry  Clay: 

*  I  went  to  see  the  new  President,  who  had  not  before  come  within  my 
contracted  range  of  vision,  and  to  mark  the  reception  accorded  to  him  by 
the  assembled  thousands.  I  came  to  gaze  on  stately  heads,  not  nimble 
feet,  and  for  an  hour  have  been  content  to  gaze  on  the  flitting  phantas- 
magoria of  senatorial  brows  and  epauletted  shoulders  —  of  orators  and 
brunettes,  office-seekers  and  beauties.  I  have  had  '  something  too  much 
of  this,'  and  lo!  'the  hour  of  hours'  has  come  —  the  buzz  of  expectation 
subsides  into  a  murmur  of  satisfaction  —  the  new  President  is  descending 
the  grand  stairway  which  terminates  in  the  ball-room,  and  the  human 
mass  forms  in  two  deep  columns  to  receive  him.  Between  these,  General 
Taylor,  supported  on  either  hand,  walks  through  the  long  saloon  and  back 
through  other  like  columns,  bowing  and  greeting  with  kind  familiarity 
those  on  this  side  and  on  that,  paying  especial  attention  to  the  ladies  as  is 
fit,  and  everywhere  welcomed  in  turn  with  the  most  cordial  good  wishes. 
All  wish  him  well  in  his  new  and  arduous  position,  even  those  who 
struggled  hardest  to  prevent  his  reaching  it. 

,  "But,  as  at  the  Inauguration,  there  is  the  least  possible  enthusiasm. 
Kow  and  then  a  cheer  is  attempted,  but  the  result  is  so  nearly  a  failure 
that  the  daring  leader  in  the  exploit  is  among  the  first  to  laugh  at  the 
miscarriage.  There  is  not  a  bit  of  heart  in  it. 

" l  They  don't  seem  to  cheer  with  much  unction,'  I  remarked  to  a  Taylor 
original. 

" '  Ne-e-o,  they  don't  cheer  much,'  he  as  faintly  replied ;  '  there  is  a  good 
deal  of  doubt  as  to  the  decorum  of  cheering  at  a  social  ball.' 

"True  enough:  the  possibility  of  indecorum  was  sufficient  to  check  the 
impulse  to  cheer,  and  very  few  passed  the  barrier.  The  cheers  '  stuck  in 
the  throat,'  like  Macbeth's  Amen,  and  the  proprieties  of  the  occasion  were 
well  cared  for. 

"  But  just  imagine  Old  Hal  walking  down  that  staircase,  the  just 
inaugurated  President  of  the  United  States,  into  the  midst  of  three  thou- 
sand of  the  flite  of  the  beauty  and  chivalry  of  the  Whig  party,  and  think 
how  the  rafters  would  have  quivered  with  the  universal  acclamation. 
Just  think  of  some  one  stopping  to  consider  whether  it  might  not  be 
indecorous  to  cheer  on  such  an  occasion  I  What  a  solitary  hermit  that 
considerer  would  bo  I 


ADDRESS   TO   CONSTITUENTS.  229 

41  Let  those  who  will,  flatter  the  chief  dispenser  of  Executive  patronage, 
discovering  in  every  act  and  feature  some  resemblance  to  Washington  —  I 
am  content  to  wait,  and  watch,  and  hope.  I  burn  no  incense  on  his  altar, 
attach  no  flattering  epithets  to  his  name.  I  turn  from  this  imposing 
pageant,  so  rich  in  glitter,  so  poor  in  feeling,  to  think  of  him  who  should 
have  been  the  central  figure  of  this  grand  panorama  —  the  distant,  the 
powerless,  the  unforgotten  —  'behind  the  mountains,  but  not  setting'  —  the 
eloquent  champion  of  Liberty  in  both  hemispheres  —  whose  voice  thrilled 
the  hearts  of  the  uprising,  the  long-trampled  sons  of  Leonidas  and  Xcno- 
phon — whose  appeals  for  South  American  independence  were  read  to  the 
hastily  mustered  squadrons  of  Bolivar,  and  nerved  them  to  sweep  from 
this  fair  continent  the  myrmidons  of  Spanish  oppression.  My  heart  is 
with  him  in  his  far  southern  abiding-place  —  with  him,  the  early  advocate 
of  African  Emancipation ;  the  life-long  champion  of  a  diversified  Ilome 
Industry;  of  Internal  Improvement;  and  not  less  glorious  in  his  later 
years  as  the  stern  reprover  of  the  fatal  spirit  of  conquest  and  aggression. 
Let  the  exulting  thousands  quaff  their  red  wines  at  the  revel  to  the  victor 
of  Monterey  and  Buena  Vista,  while  wit  points  the  sentiment  with  an 
epigram,  and  beauty  crowns  it  with  her  smiles :  more  grateful  to  me  the 
stillness  of  my  lonely  chamber,  this  cup  of  crystal  water  in  which  I  honour 
the  cherished  memory  with  the  old,  familiar  aspiration  — 

'  Here 's  to  you,  Harry  Clay !' " 

» 

A  day  or  two  afterwards  Mr.  Grceley  returned  to  New- York, 
where  he  prepared  an  address  to  his  constituents  in  which  ho 
reviewed  the  principal  proceedings  of  the  session,  and  the 
work  generally  of  the  Thirtieth  Congress,  thinking  it,  upon 
the  whole,  much  of  a  failure.  This  address  concluded  as 
follows : 

"My  work £S  your  servant  is  done — whether  well  or  ill  it  remains  for 
you  to  judge.  Very  likely  I  gave  the  wrong  vote  on  some  of  the  difficult 
and  complicated  questions  to  which  I  was  called  to  respond  Ay  or  No 
with  hardly  a  moment's  warning.  If  so,  you  can  detect  and  condemn  the 
error;  for  my  name  stands  recorded  in  the  divisions  by  Yeas  and  Nays  on 
every  public  and  all  but  one  private  bill  (which  was  laid  on  the  table  the 
moment  the  sitting  opened,  and  on  which  my  name  had  just  been  passed 
as  I  entered  the  Hall).  I  wish  it  were  the  usage  among  us  to  publish  less 
of  speeches  and  more  of  propositions  and  votes  thereupon  — it  would  give 
the  mass  of  the  people  a  much  clearer  insight  into  the  management  of 
their  publie  affairs.  My  successor  being  already  chosen  and  commis- 
sioned,  I  shall  hardly  be  suspected  of  seeking  your  further  kindness,  and 
I  shall  be  heartily  rejoiced  if  he  shall  be  able  to  combine  equal  zeal  in 
your  service  with  greater  efficiency  —  equal  fearlessness  with  greater 
popularity.  That  I  have  been  somewhat  annoyed  at  times  by  some  of  the 
consequences  of  my  Mileage  Expose  is  true,  but  I  have  never  wished  to 


230  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

recall  it,  nor  have  I  felt  that  I  owed  an  apology  to  any,  and  I  am  quite 
confident,  that  if  you  had  sent  to  Washington  (as  you  doubtless  might 
have  done)  a  more  sternly  honest  and  fearless  Representative,  he  would 
have  made  himself  more  unpopular  with  a  large  portion  of  the  House 
than  I  did.  I  thank  you  heartily  for  the  glimpse  of  public  life  which 
your  favour  has  afforded  me,  and  hope  to  render  it  useful  henceforth  not 
to  myself  only  but  to  the  public.  In  ceasing  to  be  your  agent,  and  return- 
ing with  renewed  zest  to  my  private  cares  and  duties,  I  have  a  single 
additional  favour  to  ask,  not  of  you  especially,  but  of  all ;  and  I  am  sure 
my  friends  at  least  will  grant  it  without  hesitation.  It  is  that  you  and 
they  will  oblige  me  henceforth  by  remembering  that  my  name  is  simply 

"HORACE  GREELEY." 

Twenty  years  afterwards,  Mr.  Greeley,  in  his  "  Recollections 
of  a  Busy  Life,"7  spoke  of  Congress  as  it  bad  been,  wben  be 
was  a  member,  and  as  it  was  wben  be  wrote  tbat  work,  in 
tbese  words: 

"  I  do  not  imply  that  legislation,  whether  in  Congress  or  elsewhere,  is 
purer  and  cleaner  now  than  it  was  twenty  or  forty  years  ago.  On  the  con- 
trary,  I  judge  that  it  is  oftener  swayed,  to  the  prejudice  of  the  public 
interest,  by  considerations  of  personal  advantage,  and  that  the  evil  tends 
strongly  to  increase  and  diffuse  itself.  The  chartering  of  railroads  through 
public  lands  which  are  required  (as  is  clearly  just)  to  contribute  to  their 
construction,  whether  by  liberal  grants  of  territory  or  by  direct  subsidies 
in  cash,  and  many  kindred  devices  for  promoting  at  once  public  and 
private  prosperity,  have  strongly  tended  to  render  legislation  mercenary, 
whether  in  Congress,  in  State  Legislatures,  or  in  Municipal  Councils. 
When  I  was  in  the  House,  there  were  ten  or  twelve  members  —  not  more 
than  twelve,  I  am  confident  —  who  were  generally  presumed  to  be  '  on  the 
make,'  as  the  phrase  is ;  and  they  were  a  class  by  themselves,  as  clearly  as 
if  they  were  so  many  black  sheep  in  a  large  flock  of  white  ones.  I  would 
gladly  believe  that  this  class  has  not  since  increased  in  numbers  or  in 
impudence ;  but  the  facts  do  not  justify  that  presumption." 

'Page  224. 


CIIAPTEE    XIV. 

VISITS  EUROPE. 

Crossing  the  Atlantic  —  The  Great  Exhibition  at  London  —  A  Juror— 
Sight-seeing — Mr.  Greeley's  Opinion  of  London — His  Opinion  of  the 
English  and  American  Press — Visits  Paris — Views  of  Parisian  Morals 
and  Social  Life — Predicts  the  Stability  of  the  Republic  —  Journey  to 
Lyons  —  Palaces  and  Potatoes  —  Proceeds  to  Italy  —  Sardinia — Rome 

—  St.  Peter's  and  the  Coliseum  —  The  People — Journey  to  Venice  — 
Switzerland  —  Germany  —  Belgium  —  Paris  Again  —  Returns  to  London 

—  Glances  at  Scotland  and  Ireland  —  Opinion  of  the  English  People 

—  Home. 

MR.  GREELET  had  now  laboured  constantly,  greatly,  on  The 
Tribune  for  the  full  period  of  ten  years.  He  had  also  done 
his  fair  share,  of  lecturing  and  public  speaking,  and  was 
entitled  to  a  rest.  He  had  earned  the  right  to  "go  a- fishing." 
He  accordingly  determined  to  visit  Europe,  early  in  1851 — 
the  year  of  the  Great  Exhibition,  or  World's  Fair,  at  London. 
He  left  New- York  at  noon  of  April  16,  on  the  good  steamship 
Baltic.  Sea-sickness  is  an  ailment  of  the  brain,  which  becomes 
perturbed  and  disturbed,  and,  as  it  cannot  get  out  anywhere, 
being  confined  by  the  skull,  the  stomach  fraternally  sym- 
pathizes, and  gets  very  sick  too.  During  the  first  hour  after 
seizure,  the  patient  fears  he  will  die,  and  then  he  begins  to  fear 
that  he  will  not!  Such  is  the  most  truthful  description  of 
this  complaint  I  have  seen.  The  Baltic  had  not  got  five  miles 
oft*  Sandy  Hook,  before  Mr.  Greeley  was  "  a  decided  case,"  and 
he  remained  a  decided  case  during  about  the  whole  of  the 
voyage,  the  weather  being  constantly  bad  and  the  sea  rough. 
He  conceived  a  great  disgust  for  the  authors  of  "A  Life  on 
the  Ocean  Wave,"  "The  Sea!  the  Sea!  the  Open  Sea!"  and 
such  nonsense,  and  emphatically  asseverated  that  "  a  home  on 
the  raging  deep "  is  not  a  scene  of  enjoyment  even  to  the 
Bailor. 


232  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELET. 

About  tlie  only  notable  incidents  of  the  passage  across  the 
Atlantic  were  an  iceberg  seen  to  the  northward  one  morning 
about  sunrise  (Mr.  Greeley  being  below  deck) ;  a  single  school 
of  whales  (about  which  he  heard);  and  a  few  vessels.  "But 
there  were  days,"  he  says,  "  wherein  we  saw  no  sail  but  our 
own;  and  I  think  we  traversed  nearly  a  thousand  miles  at  one 
time  on  this  great  highway  of  nations  without  seeing  one." 

Stopping  not  at  Liverpool,  Mr.  Greeley  hastened  on  to  the 
Great  Metropolis  in  order  to  be  present  at  the  opening  of  The 
World's  Fair,  on  the  1st  of  May.  He  witnessed  this  magnifi- 
cent pageant  with  evident  pleasure,  as  an  exhibition  of  royal 
display,  and  with  a  dissatisfaction  that  he  did  not  attempt  to 
conceal,  on  account  of  its  being  the  poorest  possible  occasion 
for  the  show  of  so  much  fuss  and  feathers.  "  The  Queen,  we 
will  say,"  he  writes  in  a  letter  to  The  Tribune,  "  was  here  by 
Right  Divine,  by  right  of  Womanhood,  by  Universal  Suffrage — 
any  how  you  please.  The  ceremonial  could  not  have  spared 
her.  But  in  inaugurating  the  first  grand  olympiad  of  Indus- 
try, ought  not  Industry  to  have  had  some  representation,  some 
vital  recognition,  in  her  share  of  the  pageant?  If  the  Queen 
had  come  in  state  to  the  Horse  Guards  to  review  theSliteot'  her 
military  forces,  no  one  would  doubt  that  '  the  Duke '  should 
figure  in  the  foreground,  with  a  brilliant  staff  of  Generals  and 
Colonels  surrounding  him.  So,  if  she  were  proceeding  to  open 
Parliament,  her  fitting  attendants  would  be  Ministers  and 
Counsellors  of  State.  But  what  have  her  '  Gentlemen  Usher 
of  Sword  and  State,'  'Lords  in  Waiting,'  '  Master  of  the  Horse,' 
'Earl  Marshal,'  'Groom  of  the  Stole/  'Master  of  the  Buck- 
hounds,'  and  such  uncouth  fossils,  to  do  with  a  grand  Exhibi- 
tion of  the  fruits  of  Industry?  What,  in  their  official  capacity, 
have  these  and  theirs  ever  had  to  do  with  Industry  unless  to 
burden  it,  or  with  its  Products  but  to  consume  or  destroy  them? 
The  'Mistress  of  the  Robes'  would  be  in  place  if  she  ever 
fashioned  any  robes,  even  for  the  Queen;  so  would  the  'Ladies 
of  the  Bedchamber,'  if  they  did  anything  with  beds  except  to 
sleep  in  them.  As  the  fact  is,  their  presence  only  served  to 
strengthen  the  presumption  that  not  merely  their  offices  but 
Royalty  itself  is  an  anachronism,  and  all  should  have  deceased 


GEW-OAWS  AND  EEATEE8.  233 

with  the  era  to  which  they  properly  belonged.  *  To  have  ren- 
dered the  pageant  expressive,  congruous,  and  really  a  tribute 
to  Industry,  the  posts  of  honour  next  the  Queen's  person 
should  have  been  confided  on  this  occasion  to  the  children  of 
Watt,  of  Arkwright,  and  their  compeers  (Napoleon's  real  con- 
querors); while  inetead  of  grandees  and  Foreign  Ambassadors, 
the  heirs  of  Fitch,  of  Fulton,  of  Jacquard,  of  Whitney,  of 
Daguerre,  etc.,  with  the  discoverers,  architects,  and  engineers 
to  whom  the  world  is  primarily  indebted  for  Canals,  Railroads, 
Steamships,  Electric  Telegraphs,  etc.,  etc.,  should  have  been 
specially  invited  to  swell  the  Royal  cortege." 

Mr.  Greeley  was  glad  to  see  the  Queen,  however,  and  espe- 
cially her  husband,  who  had  done  so  much  for  the  Fair.  For 
the  Crystal  Palace  he  expressed  unbounded  admiration,  think- 
ing the  triumph  of  Paxton,  its  architect,  perfect,  and  heralding 
a  revolution.  "  Depend  on  it,"  said  he,  "  stone  and  timber 
will  have  to  stand  back  for  iron  and  glass  hereafter,  to  an 
extent  not  yet  conceivable."  Of  the  Exhibition  itself  he  spoko 
in  the  highest  terms.  The  space  allotted  to  America  for  arti- 
cles was  not  filled,  whereupon  The  Times,  Punch,  and  other 
journals  went  to  disparaging  the  contributions  of  the  United 
States  on  account  of  their  meagreness  and  poverty.  This  was 
characterized  by  Mr.  Greeley  as  "  meanly  invidious  and  unde- 
served." It  was  chiefly  by  reason  of  his  own  efforts  that'a 
gratifying  change  took  place  in  the  current  of  opinion  with 
regard  to  American  invention  and  its  results.  The  triumph 
of  our  ploughs  and  reapers  was  universally  acknowledged, 
while  Mr.  Hobbs,  an  American  bank-lock  manufacturer,  went 
through  all  the  locks,  "  the  invincible  Chubb  "  inclusive,  with 
great  ease  and  dispatch.  In  gew-gaws,  tissues,  dainty  carv- 
ings, rich  mosaics,  and  articles  of  finery,  the  American  portion 
of  the  Exhibition  did  not,  of  course,  compare  with  that  of 
many  countries  of  Europe.  But,  as  Mr.  Greeley  said,  "  One 
such  plain,  odd-looking  concern  as  McCormick's  Reaper,  though 
it  makes  no  figure  in  the  eyes  of  mere  sight-seers,  in  compari- 
son with  an  inlaid  table  or  a  case  of  Paris  bonnets,  is  of  moro 
practical  account  than  a  Crystal  Palace  full  of  those,  and  so 
will  ultimately  be  regarded."  And  thus  London  and  the  world 


284  LIFE  OF  HORACE   GREELEY. 

became  convinced  that  the  American  department  of  the  Exhi- 
bition, though  less  showy  than  others,  was  nobly  creditable  to 
the  inventive  genius  and  practical  skill  of  our  countrymen. 

"When  Mr.  Greeley  reached  London,  he  found  that  he  had 
been  selected  as  Juror  representing  the  United  States  in  the 
Jury  on  Hardware,  of  which  he  was  chosen  Chairman.  His 
duties  in  this  position  required  much  time  and  labour  which 
he  cheerfully  gave.  They  enabled  him  to  see  much  more  of 
the  Exhibition  and  to  come  in  contact  with  more  eminent 
persons  than  might  otherwise  have  happened.  The  Duke  of 
Wellington — the  Duke,  then  more  than  eighty  years  old — was 
a  privileged  visitor  of  the  Crystal  Palace  during  morning 
hours,  when  the  Juries  were  making  their  examinations.  Him 
Mr.  Greeley  often  met,  and  describes  him  as  "  simply  and 
eminently  a  gentleman,"  and  one  of  the  first  to  proclaim  the 
eminent  and  remarkable  success  of  the  American  quarter,  while 
the  London  journals  were  jeering  at  the  alleged  poverty  and 
shabbiness  of  the  department.  The  journals  changed  their 
tune.  The  Duke  of  Argyle  he  describes  as  "a  small,  slight, 
sandy-haired  person,  gentle  in  manner,  modest  in  bearing." 
He  mentions  very  few  of  the  English  nobility,  however;  and 
it  is  perfectly  clear  that  for  persons  of  rank,  merely  as  such,  lie 
had  no  respect,  giving  his  admiration  to  men  of  personal 
merit,  of  whatever  station. 

One  of  the  privileges  enjoyed  by  Mr.  Greeley  on  account  of 
his  chairmanship  of  an  Awarding  Jury,  was  an  invitation  to  a 
banquet  given  the  commissioners  of  foreign  countries  at  Rich- 
mond, over  which  Lord  Ashburton  presided,  and  which  was 
attended  by  many  persons  of  rank  and  those  distinguished  in 
science  and  letters  from  many  portions  of  the  world.  "The 
feast,"  says  Mr.  Greeley,  "was  of  course  superb;  the  speaking 
fair;  the  music  abundant  and  faultless.  Good  songs  were 
capitally  given  by  eminent  vocalists;  well  sustained  by  instru- 
ments, between  the  several  toasts  with  their  responses — a 
fashion  which  1  suggest  for  adoption  in  our  own  country, 
especially  with  the  condition  that  the  speeches  be  shortened 
to  give  time  for  the  songs."  The  speakers  were  Lords  Ash- 
burton  and  Granville,  Messrs.  Grace  and  Paxton,  of  England, 


SPEECH   AT  THE  WORLD'S   FAIR   BAKQUEf.  23ft 

Baron  Dupin,  of  France,  Messrs.  Yan  de  Weyer,  of  Belgium, 
Yon  Yiebhan,  of  Prussia,  and  Horace  Greeley.  Mr.  Greeley 
had  gone  to  the  banquet  at  the  pressing  request  of  Lord  Ash- 
burton,  who  desired  that  an  American  should  propose  the 
health  of  Mr.  Paxton,  and  Mr.  Kiddle,  Commissioner  of  the 
United  States,  had  designated  him  for  that  service.  He  spoke 
about  five  minutes,  as  follows: 

"  In  my  own  land,  my  lords  and  gentlemen,  where  Nature  is  still  so 
rugged  and  unconquered,  where  Population  is  yet  so  scanty  and  the 
demands  for  human  exertion  are  so  various  and  urgent,  it  is  but  natural 
that  we  should  render  marked  honour  to  Labour,  and  especially  to  those 
who  by  invention  or  discovery  contribute  to  shorten  the  processes  and 
increase  the  efficiency  of  Industry.  It  is  but  natural,  'therefore,  that  this 
grand  conception  of  a  comparison  of  the  state  of  Industry  in  all  Nations, 
by  means  of  a  World's  Exhibition,  should  there  have  been  received  and 
canvassed  with  a  lively  and  general  interest, — an  interest  which  is  not 
measured  by  the  extent  of  our  contributions.  Ours  is  still  one  of  the 
youngest  of  Nations,  with  few  large  accumulations  of  the  fruits  of  manu- 
facturing  activity  or  artistic  skill,  and  these  so  generally  needed  for  use 
that  we  were  not  likely  to  send  them  three  thousand  miles  away,  merely 
for  show.  It  is  none  the  less  certain  that  the  progress  of  this  great  Exhi- 
bition, from  its  original  conception  to  that  perfect  realization  which  we 
here  commemorate,  has  been  watched  and  discussed  not  more  earnestly 
throughout  the  saloons  of  Europe,  than  by  the  smith's  forge  and  the 
mechanic's  bench  in  America.  Especially  the  hopes  and  fears  alternately 
predominant  on  this  side  with  respect  to  the  edifice  required  for  the  exhi- 
bition— the  doubts  as  to  the  practicability  of  erecting  one  sufficiently 
capacious  and  commodious  to  contain  and  display  the  contributions  of 
the  whole  world — the  apprehension  that  it  could  not  be  rendered  impend 
ous  to  water — the  confident  assertions  that  it  could  not  be  completed  in 
season  for  opening  the  Exhibition  on  the  first  of  May  as  promised — all 
found  an  echo  on  our  shores ;  and  now  the  tidings  that  all  these  doubts 
have  been  dispelled,  these  difficulties  removed,  will  have  been  hailed  there 
with  unmingled  satisfaction. 

"  I  trust,  gentlemen,  that  among  the  ultimate  fruits  of  this  Exhibition 
we  are  to  reckon  a  wider  and  deeper  appreciation  of  the  worth  of  Labour, 
and  especially  of  those  '  Captains  of  Industry'  by  whose  conceptions  and 
achievements  our  Race  is  so  rapidly  being  borne  onward  in  its  progress  to 
a  loftier. and  more  benignant  destiny.  We  shall  not  be  likely  to  appreciate 
less  fully  the  merits  of  the  wise  Statesmen  by  whose  measures  a  People's 
thrift  and  happiness  are  promoted — of  the  brave  Soldier,  who  joyfully 
pours  out  his  blood  in  defense  of  the  rights  or  in  vindication  of  the  honour 
of  his  Country — of  the  Sacred  Teacher,  by  whose  precepts  and  example 
our  steps  are  guided  in  the  pathway  to  heaven — if  we  render  fit  honour 


236  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

also  to  those  '  Captains  of  Industry '  -whose  tearless  victories  redden  no 
river  and  whose  conquering  march  is  unmarked  by  the  tears  of  the  widow 
and  the  cries  of  the  orphaa.  I  give  you,  therefore, 

"T?te  Health  of  Joseph  Paxton,  Esq.,  Designer  of  the  Crystal  Palace — 
Honour  to  him  whose  genius  does  honour  to  Industry  and  Man !" 

This  speech,  so  admirable  in  tone  and  happy  in  expression, 
\\as  not  included  in  the  newspaper  report  of  the  banquet,  nor 
was  Mr.  Greeley's  presence  even  mentioned!  Whether  the 
cause  of  this  omission  was  the  genuinely  democratic  spirit  of 
the  speech,  without  a  shadow  of  reference  to  kings,  lords,  and 
such  things,  or  whatever  was  the  reason,  it  gave  Mr.  Greeley  a 
fair  opportunity  to  demolish  a  recent  boast  of  The  Times  that 
the  dear  English  papers  were  superior  to  the  cheap  American 
press  in  fidelity  in  reporting. 

Mr.  Greeley  also  attended  the  annual  meeting  of  the  British 
and  Foreign  Anti-Slavery  Society,  where  he  listened  to  addresses 
in  severe  condemnation  of  American  Slavery  and  unmixed 
glorification  of  England.  The  orators  were  two  negroes,  one 
from  New- York,  the  other  from  Boston.  By  the  time  they 
were  done,  Mr.  Greeley  "  was  very  ready  to  accept  the  Chair- 
man's invitation  to  say  a  few  words."  In  doing  so,  he  urged 
upon  British  Abolitionists:  1.  Energetic  and  systematic 
exertions  to  increase  the  reward  of  Labour  and  the  comfort  and 
consideration  of  the  depressed  Labouring  Class  here  at  home; 
and  to  diffuse  and  cherish  respect  for  Man,  as  Man,  without 
regard  to  class,  colour,  or  vocation.  2.  Determined  efforts 
for  the  eradication  of  those  Social  ills  here  which  are  appealed 
to  and  relied  on  by  slaveholders  and  their  champions  as  justi- 
fying the  continuance  of  slavery.  3.  The  colonization  of  the 
American  Slave  States  by  thousands  of  moral,  industriouSj 
intelligent  free  Labourers. 

An  excellent  speech  certainly  and  a  timely,  but  it  threw  a 
very  large  wet  blanket  over  the  excessive  self-complacency 
produced  by  the  preceding  oratory. 

lie  greatly  enjoyed  the  annual  festival  of  the  "  Ancient  and 
Honourable  Company  of  Fishmongers,"  which  was  a  sump- 
tuous entertainment  not  only,  but  attended  by  a  number  of 
distinguished  persons  whom  he  was  gratified  to  know.  Among 


THE  POOR   OF   LONDON.  23'< 

these  were  Phones  Noon  Talfourd,  author  of  "Ion."  Dr. 
Lushington,  Lord  Palmerston,  and  Joseph  Hume.  An  agree- 
able evening  was  spent  with  Robert  Owen,  now  celebrating  his 
eightieth  birthday,  still  a  hale  and  hearty  man. 

Mr.  Greeley  attended  a  play  given  at  the  town  house  of  the 
Duke  of  Devonshire,  in  aid  of  The  Guild  of  Literature  and 
Art, — a  society  then  recently  established  with  the  object  of 
making  some  provision  for  unfortunate  authors  and  artists. 
The  play  given  was  Bulwer's  "Not  so  Bad  as  we  Seem,"  writ- 
ten expressly  in  aid  of  the  "Guild."  The  male  performers 
were  literary  amateurs,  the  ladies  being  actresses  by  profession. 
Charles  Dickens  had  the  principal  character,  Douglas  Jerrold 
representing  a  young  Mr.  Softhead,  "and  seemed  quite  at 
home  in  the  character."  It  was  better  played  than  Dickens's; 
but  in  a  comic  afterpiece  the  great  novelist  came  out  splen- 
didly. "  I  am  sure,"  said  Mr.  Greeley,  "  the  raw  material  of  a 
capital  comedian  was  put  to  a  better  use  when  Charles  Dickens 
took  to  authorship." 

Horace  Greejey  could  not  be  long  in  London  without  look- 
ing into  the  condition  of  the  Labouring  Classes  and  of  the 
Poor.  He  believed  that  he  saw  day-break  of  the  future  of 
Labour  in  certain  cooperative  establishments  of  the  great 
metropolis;  and  these  he  visited  and  studied  with  as  much 
attention  as  his  time  would  allow.  He  thus  visited  the  original 
Model  Lodging-House,  in  the  heart  of  St.  Giles's ;  a  "Working 
Association  of  Piano-Forte  Makers ;  a  second  Model  Lodging- 
House,  near  Tottenham  Court  Road;  a  third  establishment  of 
the  same  nature,  but  for  families,  as  the  others  were  for  single 
persons;  and  a  large  Bathing  and  "Washing  house,  where  par- 
ties could  come  and  do  washing  and  ironing,  everything  but 
soap  being  supplied,  at  very  low  rates.  All  these  establish- 
ments of  a  cooperative  nature,  and  especially  the  Lodging- 
Houses,  were  successful.  A  knowledge  of  their  operations 
was  food  for  much  thought  in  Mr.  Greeley's  after  years.  He 
never  lost  faith  in  the  idea  that  the  future  great  amelioration 
of  the  condition  of  Labour  lay  in  Cooperation — a  term  then 
comparatively  unknown,  now  well  nigh  as  familiar  as  Partner- 
ship, or  Company.  A  visit  to  a  "  Ragged  School "  in  Carter's- 


238  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

field  Lane,  Smithfield,  impressed  him  with  profound  sorrow. 
"There  are  not  many  hogs  in  America,"  he  said,  "who  are  not 
better  lodged  than  these  poor  human  brethren  and  sisters." 
He  could  not  long  endure  the  pitiable  spectacle,  but,  leaving  a 
contribution  of  money,  hastened  away  in  unspeakable  sadness. 
Very  few  generous  natures  can  witness  such  scenes  as  this,  or 
know  that  they  exist  in  every  great  city,  without  thinking 
there  is  something  radically  vicious  in  our  social  institutions. 

Such  was  the  nature  of  Horace  Greeley's  "  sight-seeing  "  in 
London  for  the  most  part.  No  chasing  after  royalty,  and 
aristocracy,  and  the  Horse  Guards  in  bloodless  review  here. 
He  did,  indeed,  spend  an  hour  or  two,  one  evening,  in  trying 
to  find  "William  and  Mary  Howitt,  but  signally  failed,  though 
they  lived,  happy  old  Quaker  couple  of  authors,  at  No.  28 
Upper  Avenue  Road,  and  he  found  Numbers  27,  29,  30,  and 
31,  also  Nos.  5  and  16  near  by,  but  no  28.  At  last,  with  help 
of  a  guide,  he  found  it  in  a  distant  part  of  the  street.  Such 
are  the  intolerable  intricacies  of  London  street-numbering. 
He  visited  Westminster  Abbey  too,  attending  divine  worship 
in  that  venerable  pile,  and  was  not  favourably  impressed  either 
with  the  building  or  the  manner  of  worship.  About  this 
latter  there  was  a  great  deal  too  much  of  "  an  Eleventh -century 
air,"  he  thought,  for  good  healthy  religious  respiration.  He 
thought  there  were  ten  churches  in  New- York  superior  to  the 
Abbey  for  purposes  of  worship. 

Mr.  Greeley  expressed  great  admiration  of  "  the  imperial 
growth "  of  London,  but  his  general  description  of  the  city 
was  of  a  very  practical  nature.  The  buildings,  he  observed, 
were  generally  superior  to  those  of  New- York;  the  streets 
were  better  paved,  cleaned,  and  lighted,  but  sadly  worse  in 
respect  to  names,  there  being  half  a  dozen  streets  and  places 
of  the  same  name,  and  the  numbering  of  many  absurdly 
vicious;  the  police  "  were  omnipresent  and  efficient."  But  the 
hotels  were  decidedly  inferior  to  those  of  New- York;  cabs  and 
carriages  for  hire  far  ahead ;  omnibusses  better  governed ;  while 
the  parks,  squares,  and  public  gardens  of  London  "beat  us 
clean  out  of  sight."  Whereupon,  Mr.  Greeley  says  that  New- 
York  ought  to  have  made  provision,  long  before,  for  a  series  of 


MS.   GEEELEY   ON   ENGLISH   NEWSPAPERS.  239 

parks  and  gardens  extending  quite  across  the  island  between 
Thirtieth  and  Fiftieth  streets.  It  is  now  too  late  for  that,  he 
adds,  and  asks,  "  where  is  to  be  the  Public  Garden  of  New- 
York?  where  the  attractive  walks  and  pleasure-grounds  of  the 
crowded  denizens  of  the  Eastern  "Wards  ?  These  must  be  pro- 
vided, and  the  work  cannot  be  commenced  too  soon."  The 
magnificent  Central  Park, — most  beautiful  and  attractive 
pleasure-grounds  of  America, — has  answered  Horace  Greeley's 
questions  of  1851,  and  complied  with  his  wise  demand. 

When  Mr.  Greelej  arrived  in  England,  the  discussion  of 
"  the  taxes  on  knowledge  "  which  had  for  some  time  attracted 
much  attention  from  the  general  public  had  reached  Parlia- 
ment, where  the  repeal  of  such  taxation  had  many  friends.  A 
committee,  of  which  the  Rt.  Hon.  T.  Milnor  Gibson  was  chair- 
man, and  the  celebrated  Richard  Cobden  one  of  the  members, 
had  the  subject  in  charge,  and  requested  Mr.  Greeley  to  appear 
and  give  them  the  results  of  his  experience  and  observation. 
He  was  examined  at  great  length  by  the  committee.  The  taxes 
complained  of  *were  an  impost  upon  advertisements,  and  a 
stamp-tax  of  one  penny  per  copy  on  every  newspaper.  The 
substantial  portions  of  Mr.  Greeley's  examination  were  as 
follows: 

Your  duty  is  the  same  on  the  advertisements  in  a  journal  with  fifty 
thousand  circulation,  as  in  a  journal  with  one  thousand,  although  the  valut 
of  the  article  is  twenty  times  as  much  in  the  one  case  as  in  the  other.  The 
duty  operates  precisely  as  though  you  were  to  lay  a  tax  of  one  shilling  a 
day  on  every  day's  labour  that  a  man  were  to  do ;  to  a  man  whose  labour 
is  worth  two  shillings  a  day,  it  would  be  destructive ;  while  by  a  man  who 
earns  twenty  shillings  a  day,  it  would  be  very  lightly  felt.  An  advertise- 
ment is  worth  but  a  certain  amount,  and  the  public  soon  get  to  know  what 
it  is  worth ;  you  put  a  duty  on  advertisements  and  you  destroy  the  value 
of  those  coming  to  new  establishments.  People  who  advertise  in  your 
well-established  journals,  could  afford  to  pay  a  price  to  include  the  duty; 
but  in  a  new  paper,  the  advertisements  would  not  be  worth  the  amount  of 
the  duty  alone;  and  consequently  the  new  concern  would  have  no  chance. 
Now,  the  advertisements  are  one  main  source  of  the  income  of  daily 
papers,  and  thousands  of  business  men  take  them  mainly  for  those  adver- 
tisements. For  instance,  at  the  time  when  our  auctioneers  were  appointed 
by  law  (they  were,  of  course,  party  politicians),  one  journal,  which  was 
high  in  the  confidence  of  the  party  in  power,  obtained  not  a  law,  but  an 
understanding,  that  all  the  auctioneers  appointed  should  advertise  in  that 


240  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GREELEY. 

journal.  Now,  though  the  journal  referred  to  haa  ceased  to  be  of  that 
party,  and  the  auctioneers  are  no  longer  appointed  by  the  State,  yet  that 
journal  has  almost  the  monopoly  of  the  auctioneers'  business  to  this  day. 
Auctioneers  must  advertise  in  it  because  they  know  that  purchasers  are 
looking  there;  and  purchasers  must  take  the  paper, because  they  know 
that  it  contains  just  the  advertisements  they  want  to  see;  and  this, 
without  regard  to  the  goodness  or  the  principles  of  the  paper.  I  know 
men  in  this  town  who  take  one  journal  mainly  for  its  advertisements,  and 
they  must  take  the  Times,  because  everything  is  advertised  in  it ;  for  the 
same  reason,  advertisers  must  advertise  in  the  Times.  If  we  had  a  duty  on 
advertisements,  I  will  not  say  it  would  be  impossible  to  build  a  new  con- 
cern up  in  New- York  against  the  competition  of  the  older  ones ;  but  I  do 
say,  it  would  be  impossible  to  preserve  the  weaker  papers  from  being 
swallowed  up  by  the  stronger. 

Mr.  COBDEN — Do  you  then  consider  the  fact,  that  the  Times  newspaper 
for  the  last  fifteen  years  has  been  increasing  so  largely  in  circulation,  is  to 
be  accounted  for  mainly  by  the  existence  of  the  advertising  duty  ? 

Mr.  GREELET — Yes ;  much  more  than  the  stamp.  By  the  operation  of 
the  advertisement  duty,  an  advertisement  is  charged  ten  times  as  much  in 
one  paper  as  in  another.  An  advertisement  in  the  Times  may  be  worth 
five  pounds,  while  in  another  paper  it  is  only  worth  one  pound ;  but  the 
duty  is  the  same. 

Mr.  RICH — The  greater  the  number  of  small  advertisements  in  papers, 
the  greater  advantage  to  their  proprietors? 

Mr.  GREELET — Yes.  Suppose  the  cost  of  a  small  advertisement  to  be 
five  shillings,  the  usual  charge  in  the  Times;  if  you  have  to  pay  a  shilling 
or  eighteen  pence  duty,  that  advertisement  is  worth  nothing  in  a  journal 
with  a  fourth  part  of  the  circulation  of  the  Times. 

CHAIRMAN — Does  it  not  appear  to  you  that  the  taxes  on  the  press  are 
hostile  to  one  another ;  in  the  first  place,  lessening  the  circulation  of  papers 
by  means  of  the  stamp  duty,  we  diminish  the  consumption  of  paper,  and 
therefore  lessen  the  amount  of  paper  duty;  secondly,  by  diminishing  the 
sale  of  papers  through  the  stamp,  we  lessen  the  number  of  advertisements, 
and  therefore  the  receipts  of  the  advertisement  duty  ? 

Mr.  GREELEY — I  should  say  that  if  the  government  were,  simply  as  a 
matter  of  revenue,  to  fix  a  duty,  say  of  half  a  penny  per  pound,  on  paper, 
it  would  be  easily  collected,  and  produce  more  money;  and  then,  a  law 
which  is  equal  in  its  operation  does  not  require  any  considerable  number 
of  officers  to  collect  the  duty,  and  it  would  require  no  particular  vigilance ; 
and  the  duty  on  paper  alone  would  be  most  equal  and  most  efficient  as  a 
revenue  duty. 

CHAIRMAN — It  is  clear,  then,  that  the  effect  of  the  stamp  and  advertise- 
ment duty  is  to  lessen  the  amount  of  the  receipts  from  the  duty  on  paper  ? 

Mr.  GREELEY — Enormously.  I  see  that  the  circulation  of  daily  papers 
in  London  is  but  sixty  thousand,  against  a  hundred  thousand  in  New- 
York;  while  the  tendency  is  more  to  concentrate  in  London  than  in 


ON   ENGLISH   JOURNALS.  241 

New-York.  Not  a  tenth  part  of  our  daily  papers  are  printed  in  New- 
York. 

CHAFRMAN — When  a  person  proposes  to  publish  a  paper  in  New- York, 
he  is  not  required  to  go  to  any  office  to  register  himself,  or  to  give  security 
that  he  will  not  insert  libels  or  seditious  matter?  A  newspaper  publisher 
is  not  subject  to  any  liability  more  than  other  persons? 

Mr.  GKEELEY — No;  no  more  than  a  man  that  starts  a  blacksmith's 
shop. 

Mr.  COBDEN — From  what  you  have  stated  with  regard  to  the  circulation 
of  the  daily  papers  in  New- York,  it  appears  that  a  very  large  proportion 
of  the  adult  population  must  be  customers  for  them  ? 

Mr.  GREELEY — Yes;  I  think  three-fourths  of  all  the  families  take  a  daily 
paper  of  some  kind. 

Mr.  COBDEN — The  purchasers  of  the  daily  papers  must  consist  of  a  dif- 
ferent class  from  those  in  England;  mechanics  must  purchase  them? 

Mr.  GREELEY — Every  mechanic  takes  a  paper,  or  nearly  every  one.' 

Mr.  COBDEN — Do  those  people  generally  get  them  before  they  leave  home 
for  their  work  ? 

Mr.  GREELEY — Yes;  and  you  are  complained  of  if  you  do  not  furnish  a 
man  with  his  newspaper  at  his  breakfast ;  he  wants  to  read  it  between  six 
or  seven  usually? 

Mr.  COBDEN — Then  a  ship-builder,  or  a  cooper,  or  a  joiner,  needs  hia 
daily  paper  at  his  breakfast-time  ? 

Mr.  GREELEY — Yes ;  and  he  may  take  it  with  him  to  read  at  his  dinner 
between  twelve  and  one ;  but  the  rule  is,  that  he  wants  his  paper  at  his 
breakfast. 

Mr.  COBDEN — After  he  has  finished  his  breakfast  or  his  dinner,  he  may 
be  found  reading  the  daily  newspaper,  just  as  the  people  of  the  upper 
classes  do  in  England  ? 

Mr.  GREELEY — Yes. 

Mr.  EWART — Is  scurillity  or  personality  common  in  the  publications  of 
the  United  States? 

Mr.  GREELEY — It  is  not  common;  it  is  much  less  frequent  than  it  was; 
but  it  is  not  absolutely  unknown. 

CHAIRMAN — As  the  demand  is  extensive,  is  the  remuneration  for  the  ser- 
vices of  the  literary  men  who  are  employed  on  the  press,  good  ? 

Mr.  GREELEY — The  prices  of  literary  labour  are  more  moderate  than  in 
this  country.  The  highest  salary,  I  think,  that  would  be  commanded  by 
any  one  connected  with  the  press  would  be  five  thousand  dollars — the 
highest  that  could  be  thought  of.  I  have  not  heard  of  higher  than  three 
thousand. 

CHAIRMAN — Are  your  leading  men  in  America,  in  point  of  literary  abil- 
ity, employed  from  time  to  time  upon  the  press  as  an  occupation  ? 

Mr.  GREELEY — It  is  beginning  to  be  so,  but  it  has  not  been  the  custom. 
There  have  been  leading  men  connected  with  the  press ;  but  the  press  has 
not  been  usually  conducted  by  the  most  powerful  men.  With  a  few  ex- 
ceptions, the  leading  political  journals  are  conducted  ably,  and  they  are 
16 


242  LIFE  OF  HORACE   GREELET. 

becoming  more  so;  and,  with  a  wider  diffusion  of  the  circulation,  the 
press  is  more  able  to  pay  for  it. 

CHAIRMAN — Do  not  you  consider  that  newspaper  reading  is  calculated 
to  keep  up  a  habit  of  reading? 

Mr.  GREELEY — I  think  it  is  worth  all  the  schools  in  the  country.  1 
think  it  creates  a  taste  for  reading  in  every  child's  mind,  and  it  increases 
his  interest  in  his  lessons;  he  is  attracted  from  always  seeing  a  newspaper 
and  hearing  it  read,  I  think. 

CHAIRMAN — Supposing  that  you  had  your  schools  as  now,  but  that  your 
newspaper  press  were  reduced  within  the  limits  of  the  press  in  England, 
do  you  not  think  that  the  habit  of  reading  acquired  at  school  would  be 
frequently  laid  aside  ? 

Mr.  GREELEY — I  think  that  the  habit  would  not  be  acquired,  and  that 
paper  reading  would  fall  into  disuse. 

Mr.  EWART — Having  observed  both  countries,  can  you  state  whether  the 
press  has  greater  influence  on  public  opinion  in  the  United  States  than  in 
England,  or  the  reverse  ? 

Mr.  GREELEY — I  think  it  has  more  influence  with  us.  I  do  not  know 
that  any  class  is  despotically  governed  by  the  press  but  its  influence  is 
more  universal ;  every  one  reads  and  talks  about  it  with  us,  and  more 
weight  is  laid  upon  intelligence  than  on  editorials;  the  paper  which  brings 
the  quickest  news  is  the  thing  looked  to. 

Mr.  EWART — The  leading  article  has  not  so  much  influence  as  in  Eng- 
land? 

Mr.  GREELEY — No ;  the  telegraphic  dispatch  is  the  great  point. 

Mr.  COBDEN — Observing  our  newspapers  and  comparing  them  with  the 
American  papers,  do  you  find  that  we  make  much  less  use  of  the  electric 
telegraph  for  transmitting  news  than  in  America  ? 

Mr.  GREELEY — Not  a  hundredth  part  as  much  as  we  do. 

Mr.  COBDEN — An  impression  prevails  in  this  country  that  our  newspaper 
press  incurs  a  great  deal  more  expense  to  expedite  news  than  you  do  in 
New- York.  Are  you  of  that  opinion? 

Mr.  GREELEY — I  do  not  know  what  j'our  expense  is.  I  should  say  that 
a  hundred  thousand  dollars  a  year  is  paid  by  our  association  of  the  six 
leading  daily  papers,  besides  what  each  gets  separately  for  itself. 

Mr.  COBDEN — Twenty  thousand  pounds  a  year  is  paid  by  your  association, 
consisting  of  six  papers,  for  what  you  get  in  common  ? 

Mr.  GREELEY — Yes;  we  telegraph  a  great  deal  in  the  United  States.  As- 
suming that  a  scientific  meeting  was  held  at  Cincinnati  this  year,  we 
should  telegraph  the  reports  from  that  place,  and  I  presume  other  journals 
would  have  special  reporters  to  report  the  proceedings  at  length.  "We 
have  a  reoort  everv  day,  fifteen  hundred  miles,  from  New  Orleans;  from 
8t.  Louis,  too,  and  other  places. 

The  Committee  then  adjourned. 

From  this  time  forth  the  unpopularity  of  "the  taxes  on 
knowledge"  rapidly  increased,  and  they  were  at  length  re- 


CROSsraa  THE  CHANNEL.  243 

pealed.  The  people  of  England  are  very  greatly  indebted  for 
having  the  Cheap  Press  so  soon  as  they  did  to  the  Founder  of 
The  New- York  Tribune. 

Having  spent  not  quite  two  months  in  London,  —  in  which 
few  weeks  he  had  been  able  to  confer  valuable  renown  upon  his 
country  and  to  aid  the  cause  of  human  progress,  —  Mr.  Greeley 
proceeded  to  Paris.  The  journey  by  rail  from  London  to 
Dover,  —  a  very  mean,  old  town,  as  he  thought,  —  suggested  to 
his  mind,  seeing  so  little  attention  to  fruit  culture,  the  busi- 
ness of  exporting  dried  fruit,  especially  peaches,  from  America 
to  England.  And  he  told  exactly  how  the  business  ought  to 
be  done  in  order  to  be  profitable.  The  steamboat  in  which  he 
crossed  the  Channel  "  was  one  of  those  long,  black,  narrow  scow 
contrivances,  about  equal  to  a  buttonwood  'dug-out,'  which 
England  appears  to  delight  in.  *  In  this  wretched  concern, 
which  was  too  insignificant  to  be  slow,  we  went  cobbling  and 
wriggling  across  the  Channel  (27  miles)  in  something  less  than 
two  hours,  often  one  gunwale  nearly  under  water  and  the  other 
ten  or  twelve  feet  above  it,  with  no  room  under  deck  for  half 
our  passengers,  and  the  spray  frequently  dashing  over  those 
above  it,  three-fourths  of  the  whole  number  deadly  sick  (this 
individual  of  course  included),  when  with  a  decent  boat  the 
passage  might  be  regularly  made,  in  spite  of  such  smartish 
breeze  as  we  encountered,  in  comparative  comfort."  The 
Channel  is  noted  for  making  one  discharge  one's  atrabilarious- 
ness.  "  We  were  detained/'  he  says,  "  a  long  hour  in  Calais — 
a  queer  old  town,  with  little  trade  and  only  a  historical  impor- 
tance—  although  GIT  baofg-agj  was  not  examined  there,  but 
sealed  up  for  oustom-liousu  _/:rutiny  at  Paris.  They  made  a 
few  dollars  out  of  rs  by  charging  for  extra  baggage,  one  of 
them  out  of  me,  thorgh  i^y  trunk  contained  only  clothing  and 
three  or  four  book?,  fema1.!  business  this  for  a  railroad,  though 
it  will  do  in  stage  ir^Aepoitaticn.  Oui  passports  were  scruti- 
nized, we  (the  green  ones)  oHained  an  execrable  dinner  for  37£ 
cents,  and  changed  some  sovereigns  for  French  silver  at  a  shave 
which  was  not  atrocious.  ^mall""",  we  wer3  all  let  go." 

And  away  they  went  over  the  flat  marshy  country  to  the 
world's  fashionable  metropolis,   not  arriving  there  rii'lil  2 


244  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GREELEY. 

o'clock  Sunday  morning,  instead  of  10£  the  previous  evening, 
according  to  advertisement.  Here  Mr.  Greeley  made  his 
"  first  attempt  at  mouthing  French,"  and  a  friend  (not  of  the 
"  green  ones  "),  having  drilled  him,  he  bravely  sang  out  "  sauk- 
on-du"  for  his  trunk  (52-cinqttante-deux — by  number)  and 
eucceeded  in  making  himself  intelligible.  He  found  shelter 
but  no  bed  at  the  Hotel  Choiseul,  Rue  St.  Honorc,  the  city 
being  overcrowded  with  visitors.  After  breakfast  he  repaired 
to  the  famous  Church  of  Madeleine,  reputed  one  of  the  finest 
in  Europe.  The  service,  much  of  it  being  "  inexplicable  dumb 
show  "  to  him,  was  not  pleasing,  but  he  quoted: 

"  Peace  be  with  all,  whate'er  their  varying  creeds, 
With  all  who  send  up  holy  thoughts  on  high." 

That  which  appeared  to  strike  Mr.  Greeley  most  forcibly  in 
the  social  life  of  Paris  was  the  general,  almost  universal,  pur- 
suit of  amusement.  The  Frenchman's  pleasures,  he  thought, 
were  all  social.  "  To  eat,  drink,  or  spend  the  evening  alone 
would  be  a  weariness  to  him :  he  reads  his  newspaper  in  the 
thoroughfare  or  the  public  gardens:  he  talks  more  in  one  day 
than  an  Englishman  in  three:  the  theatres,  balls,  concerts,  etc., 
which  to  the  islander  afford  occasional  recreation,  are  to  him  a 
nightly  necessity:  he  would  be  lonely  and  miserable  without 
them.  Nowhere  is  Amusement  more  systematically,  sedu- 
lously sought  than  in  Paris ;  nowhere  is  it  more  abundant  or 
accessible.  For  boys  just  escaped  from  school  or  paternal 
restraint,  intent  on  enjoyment  and  untroubled  by  conscience 
or  forecast,  this  must  be  a  ra--e  city.  It?  people,  as  a  com- 
munity, have  signal  good  cMia'iti^s  and  grave  defects:  they 
are  intelligent,  vivacious,  com  tec u::,  obliging,  geneious,  and 
humane;  eager  to  enjoy,  bat  willing  chat  all  the  world  should 
enjoy  with  them;  while  at  the  s?m«'  *Ame  they  are  impulsive, 
fickle,  sensual,  and  irreverent.  Paris  ?'s  fhe  Paradise  of  the 
Senses;  a  focus  of  Enjoyment,  not  cf  Happiness.  Nowhere 
are  Youth  and  its  capacities  mere  prodigally  lavished ;  nowhere 
is  old  age  less  happy  or  less  respected.  Paris  has  tens  of  thou- 
sands who  would  eagerly  pour  out  their  hearts'  blood  for 
liberty  and  human  progress,  but  no  class  or  clan  who  ever 


FRAJTCE    A  REPUBLIC.  245 

thought  of  denying  themselves  wine  and  kindred  stimulants 
in  order  that  the  masses  should  be  rendered  worthier  of  liberty 
and  thus  better  fitted  to  preserve  and  enjoy  it." 

The  want  of  respect  for  Marriage  he  thought  was  productive 
of  great  demoralization.  "  In  no  other  nominally  Christian 
city  is  the  proportion  of  the  unmarried  so  great  as  here,"  said 
he;  "nowhere  else  do  families  so  quickly  decay ;  nowhere  else 
is  the  proportion  of  births  out  of  wedlock  so  appalling."  In 
line,  Mr.  Greeley  placed  a  very  low  estimate  upon  Parisian 
morals. 

Some  writers  have  said  that  Mr.  Greeley's  judgment  of  the 
political  situation  in  France  was  exceedingly  erroneous;  his 
forecast  of  the  future  especially  wrong.  He  said,  "  alike  by 
its  own  strength  and  by  its  enemies'  divisions,  the  safety  of 
the  Republic  is  assured ;  and  time  is  on  the  popular  side,  and 
every  hour's  endurance  adds  strength  to  the  Eepublic."  Still 
again:  "I  marvel  at  the  obliquity  of  vision  whereby  any  one 
is  enabled,  standing  in  this  metropolis,  to  anticipate  the  sub- 
version of  the  'Republic  and  the  restoration  of  Monarchy." 
Those  who  have  criticised  Mr.  Greeley  as  herein  misjudging 
have,  it  would  appear,  misjudged  him.  In  the  sentences  quoted 
and  other  similar  expressions  he  intended  to  express  the 
opinion  that  France  had  become  genuinely  Republican,  and 
that  such  would  continue  to  be  the  permanent  form  of  gov- 
ernment. But  he  also  expressly  stated  that  the  Republic  was 
in  great  danger  on  account  of  certain  evil  laws,  and  might 
thereby  suifer  temporary  disaster.  In  the  letter  in  which 
occurs  his  strongest  asseveration  of  the  permanency  of  the 
Republic,  he  says :  "  The  French  have  great  faults  of  char- 
acter which  imperil  the  immediate  fortunes  of  the  Republic 
but  cannot  affect  its  ultimate  ascendency*  Impulsive  and 
egotistic,  they  may  seem  willing  to  exchange  Liberty  for 
Tranquillity  or  Security,  but  this  will  be  a  momentary  caprice, 
soon  past  and  forgotten  The  Nafion  can  ae.Tei  more  be  other 
than  Republican,  though  the  p^cs°Pf.ors  cf  power,  controlling 
the  Press,  the  Bureaus,  .the  As&STobly,  and  tb.e  A"mv.  ciay 
fancy  that  their  personal  interests  would  be  promoted  bv  a 
less  popular  system,  and  so  be  seen  for  3.  Deason  following 


24:6  LIFE  OF  HORACE   GREELEY. 

strange  gods.  This  delusion  and  apostacy  will  speedily  pass, 
leaving  only  their  shame  behind,"  He  not  only  saw  an 
immediate  peril  to  the  Republic,  in  the  great  faults  of  char- 
acter of  the  French,  but  also  in  the  arbitrary  disfranchisement 
of  nearly  one-half  the  democratic  voters,  the  manacled  condi- 
tion of  the  press,  the  denial  to  the  people  of  the  right  of 
public  assemblage,  and  the  betrayal  of  the  enormous  power 
and  patronage  of  government  into  the  hands  of  the  Aristo- 
cratic party.  In  consideration  of  these  things,  he  clearly  saw 
"  the  immediate  peril  of  the  Republic  "  in  the  election  which 
would  take  place  in  May  of  the  following  year.  The  Republic 
might  "be  then  engulfed,  but  it  would  not  be  for  long.  Such 
was  the  whole  of  Mr.  Greeley's  opinion  in  1851.  Those  who 
treated  it  lightly  about  1854,  might  have  changed  their  minds 
inside  of  twenty  years.  Mr.  Greeley  looked  farther  into  a 
quarter  of  a  century  to  come  than  they  did. 

Before  his  departure  for  Lyons  he  visited  several  of  the  late 
Royal,  then  and  now  National  Palaces  of  France,  and  though 
acknowledging  their  beauty  and  splendour,  it  is  very  clear  that 
the  sight  of  them  impressed  him  unfavourably;  that  he  would 
rather  have  contemplated  a  prosperous  potato-patch  than  the 
bewildering  "  glories "  of  Versailles.  He  thought  some  of 
these  palaces  ought  to  be  converted  into  Hospitals,  Libraries, 
Galleries  of  Art,  etc.  Versailles,  however,  was  a  bad  bargain, 
and  "  could  not  be  sold  as  it  stands,  for  a  tenth  of  its  actual 
cost!"  Clearly,  these  "  Royal  Palaces  "  abated  no  whit  of  the 
democracy  of  this  man  of  the  people.  "Pe^hap,?  it  will  be 
best,  therefore,"  he  said,  "  to  convert  ail  tne  others  into  direct 
uses  and  preserve  Versa'lles  for  public  inspection  as  a  perpet- 
ual memorial  cf  the  reckless  prodigality  and  all-devouring 
pomp  of  Kings,  an:1,  as  a  w?,rr.ing  to  Nations  never  again  to 
entrust  their  aes'Inies  to  men  whc,  from  their  very  education 
and  the  influences  surrounding  .'aem  through  life,  must  be  led 
to  consider  the  'roiling  Millions  as  mainly  created  to  pamper 
tbdr  appetites,  to  granfj  tveir  p~ide,  and  to  pave  with  their 
corf  SGo  1  he:r  road  to  extended  dominion."  He  spent  a  good 
p»it  of  cwo  c:&yc,  howeve^,  ?n  the  Louvre,  whose  galleries,  he 


ON   DILIGENCE  TO   TURIN.  24:7 

said,  "contain  more  strikingly  good  paintings  than  I  shall 
iver  again  see  under  one  roof." 

He  proceeded  by  rail  from  Paris  to  Chalons  on  the  Saone, 
but  on  account  of  bad  management  at  depots  and  by  omnibus 
men,  he  did  not  reach  the  landing  in  time  to  take  the  steam- 
boat for  Lyons.  Getting  a  good  room,  however  with  a  clean 
bed,  and  plenty  of  water  (for  France)  and  there  being  no  sleep- 
ing accommodations  on  the  departed  boat,  he  philosophically 
concluded,  "I  was  rather  glad  we  had  been  swindled  than 
otherwise." 

The  voyage  on  the  Saone  to  Lyons  was  pleasant,  but  the 
scenery  tame,  he  thought,  in  comparison  with  that  of  the  Con- 
necticut or  the  Hudson.  Lyons,  notable  for  its  manufacture 
of  silks,  the  focus  of  Democratic  Socialism,  was  at  the  time  in 
a  situation  of  commercial  depression.  Whereupon  Mr.  Greeley 
indited  a  brief  essay  undertaking  to  show  that  "  it  is  not  best 
for  themselves  nor  for  mankind  that  100,000  silk-workers 
should  be  clustered  on  any  square  mile  or  two  of  earth."  They 
ought  to  be  scattered  widely  over  the  world,  in  the  interest  of 
Industry.  He  carried  the  Protectionist  argument  for  Diversity 
of  Industry  to  an  extreme  which  may  be  called,  not  to  be  too 
reverent,  the  Scatteration  of  Industry.  And  it  certainly  would 
be  very  convenient  if  Lyons  silks,  as  well  as  California  gold 
mines,  South  African  diamond  fields,  and  such,  were  distrib- 
uted around  a  little  more  generously  than  they  are.  Until 
they  shall  be,  it  may  be  regarded  as  inevitable  that  trade  and 
commerce  meet  with  occasional  "  depressions." 

At  Lyons,  Mr.  Greeley  turned  aside  from  the  general  route 
thence  to  Italy,  and  booked  himself  for  a  ride  across  the  Lower 
Alps  by  diligence  to  Turin.  He  took  a  seat  in  the  banquette, 
on  top  of  the  diligence,  and  away  the  lumbering  vehicle  sped, 
drawn  by  four  horses,  first  over  a  level,  productive  country  to 
the  frontiers  of  Savoy,  where  began  the  country  of  mountains. 
"They  rose  before  and  around  us,"  he  writes,  "from  the 
moment  of  our  crossing  the  boundary, — grim,  rugged,  and 
precipitous,  they  formed  a  striking  contrast  to  all  of  Europe  I 
had  hitherto  seen."  All  through  Savoy,  he  was  ever  in  sight 
of  snow-covered  peaks.  He  saw  quite  as  many  women  as  men 


24:8  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELET. 

at  work  in  the  fields,  and  did  not  like  the  sight.  At  Cham- 
bery,  the  capital  of  ancient  Savoy,  the  diligence  made  a  halt, 
and  the  passengers  were  allowed  twenty-five  minutes  for  break- 
fast, which  would  have  been  very  well  but  that  the  time 
required  for  cooking  most  of  the  breakfast  had  to  come  out  of 
it.  Mr.  Greeley  gives  this  account  of  his  Savoyard  breakfast: 

"  There  was  enough,  and  good  enough  to  eat,  wine  in  abundance  without 
charge,  but  tea,  coffee,  or  chocolate,  must  be  ordered  and  paid  for  extra. 
Yet  I  was  unable  to  obtain  a  cup  of  chocolate,  the  excuse  being  that  there 
was  not  time  to  make  it.  I  did  not  understand,  therefore,  why  I  was 
charged  more  than  others  for  breakfast ;  but  to  talk  English  against  French 
or  Italian  is  to  get  a  mile  behind  in  no  time,  so  I  pocketed  the  change 
offered  me  and  came  away.  On  the  coach,  however,  with  an  Englishman 
near  me  who  had  travelled  this  way  before  and  spoke  French  and  Italian, 
I  ventured  to  express  my  ignorance  as  follows : 

" '  Neighbour,  why  was  I  charged  three  francs  for  breakfast,  and  the  rest 
of  you  but  two  and  a  half? ' 

" '  Don't  know — perhaps  you  had  tea  or  coffee.' 

" '  No,  sir — don't  drink  either.' 

" '  Then  perhaps  you  washed  your  face  and  hands.' 

"  'Well,  it  would  be  just  like  me.' 

" '  O,  then,  that's  it !    The  half  franc  was  for  the  basin  and  towel.' 

44 '  Ah,  out,  0Mt.'    So  the  milk  in  that  cocoanut  was  accounted  for." 

Over  Mount  Cenis,  up  by  slow  travel,  the  diligence  now 
drawn  by  eight  horses,  down  at  breakneck  speed,  two  horses 
and  the  brakes  sulficing,  and  daylight  found  the  traveller  in 
the  valley  of  the  Po,  the  great  plain  of  Upper  Italy,  with 
breakfast — June  20 — in  Turin  before  9  o'clock.  Mr.  Greeley 
was  much  pleased  with  Turin,  which,  under  the  liberal  govern- 
ment of  Yictor  Emmanuel,  was  at  this  time  rapidly  increasing 
in  industry  and  population.  But  he  thought  Genoa,  which  he 
visited  next,  superior  in  most  respects  if  not  in  all.  "  I  never 
saw,"  he  says,  in  a  letter  of  June  22d,  "so  many  churches  so 
admirably  constructed  and  so  gorgeously,  laboriously  orna- 
mented as  the  half  dozen  I  visited  yesterday  and  this  morning." 
He  was  greatly  pleased  with  the  modest,  graceful  monument 
to  Christopher  Columbus,  the  Genoese  discoverer  of  America, 
and  charmed  with  the  costly,  beautiful  architecture  of  the  city. 
His  bed-room  at  the  "  Hotel  des  Londres,"  was  larger,  with 


ROME,  249 

more  lofty  ceilings,  than  most  American  parlours  or  drawing- 
rooms. 

Mr.  Greeley  carefully  studied  the  political  situation  in  the 
Kingdom  of  Sardinia,  and  considering  that  the  King  had 
nobly  redeemed  his  promise  "to  rear  free  institutions  in  the 
midst  of  surrounding  ruins,"  by  the  establishment  of  religious 
freedom  and  a  Free  Press,  lie  thought  those  were  in  this 
instance  in  the  right  who  held  fast  by  King  and  Constitution, 
the  Monarch  being  most  zealous  in  the  cause  of  progress  and 
reform.  He  regretted  the  necessity  of  an  army  of  fifty  thou- 
sand men,  and  another,  not  necessary,  of  sixty  thousand 
priests  (and  no  common  schools!);  nevertheless,  lie  predicted 
Italy's  future  as  a  Federal  Republic.  It  seems  probable  already 
that  he  herein  correctly  saw  the  coming  events;  and  his  bright 
vision  of  United  Italy  has  for  many  years  been  realized.  But 
he  was  less  confident  after  he  had  seen  more  of  Italy. 

From  Genoa  Mr.  Greeley  proceeded  to  Leghorn  in  a 
"wretched  old  apology  for  a  steamship,"  and  thence  wrote  a 
letter  in  which  he'  "  blew  up  "  the  Yankee  consuls,  the  Tuscan 
police,  and  French  government  steamships  in  the  Mediter- 
ranean, but  it  never  came  to  hand.  He  visited  Pisa,  and 
thought  the  wonderful  Leaning  Tower  worthy  of  all  the  fame  it 
has  acquired.  The  day  before  his  visit  was  the  anniversary  of 
the  Patron  Saint  of  Pisa,  which  was  this  year  celebrated  with 
great  pomp,  $100,000  being  expended  for  fire-works,  "though 
Pisa  cannot  afford,"  he  dryly  remarks,  "  to  sustain  free  com- 
mon schools  or  make  any  provision  for  the  education  of  her 
children.  Of  course  she  can  afford  to  die,  or  is  certain  to 
do  it,  whether  she  can  afford  it  or  not." 

Returning  to  Leghorn,  he  went  thence  by  steamer  to  Civita 
Yecchia,  where  he  saw  four  sorts  of  men  only,  namely,  officials 
engaged  in  fleecing  travellers,  priests,  soldiers,  and  beggars. 
Thus  his  entrance  into  the  Papal  States  impressed  him  very 
unfavourably,  and  the  ride  of  twenty -five  miles  by  diligence  to 
Rome,  through  a  country  in  a  condition  showing  utter  shift- 
lessness,  added  to  his  disappointment. 

But  Rome  "is  mighty  even  in  her  desolation.  I  knew,'  he 
continues,  "the  world  had  nothing  like  her,  and  yet  tho 


250  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

impression  she  has  made  on  me,  at  the  first  view,  is  unexpect- 
edly great."  He  remained  in  the  city  but  a  -week.  He 
thought  the  churches  of  Rome  richer  in  sculpture,  porphyry, 
mosaic,  carving,  tapestry,  etc.,  than  anything  elsewhere  well 
can  be;  but  not  equal  in  architecture  to  the  finest  churches  in 
Genoa,  the  Cathedral  at  Pisa,  and,  externally,  to  Notre  Dame 
at  Paris.  As  to  sculpture  and  painting,  he  was  tempted  to  say 
that  "if  mankind  were  compelled  to  choose  between  the 
destruction  of  what  is  in  Rome  or  that  of  all  the  rest  in  the 
world,  the  former  should  be  saved  at  the  expense  of  the  latter." 
But  he  was  not  impressed  with  the  superiority  of  ancient  over 
modern  art;  and  was  decidedly  of  opinion  that  Rome  has 
been  unwisely  grasping  with  regard  to  works  of  art.  Upon 
this  subject  he  gave  some  excellent  practical  suggestions  which 
would  be  found  valuable  to  this  day. 

St.  Peter's  he  regarded  as  "  the  Niagara  of  edifices,  having 
the  same  relation  to  other  master-pieces  of  human  effort  that 
the  great  cataract  bears  to  other  terrestrial  effects  of  Divine 
power."  Time  and  genius,  he  thought,  may  produce  other 
structures  as  admirable  in  their  own  way  and  regarded  in  con- 
nection with  their  uses;  but  viewed  as  a  temple,  St.  Peter's 
will  ever  stand  unmatched  and  unapproachable.  His  first  visit 
was  in  the  early  morning,  and  he  found  no  time  when  the 
great  structure  was  so  impressive.  It  is  doubtful  whether 
there  have  been  any  more  genuine  appreciative  descriptions  of 
St.  Peter's  than  Horace  Greeley's.  "Go  very  early,"  lie 
advises,  "  if  you  would  see  St.  Peter's  in  its  calm  and  stately 
grandeur."  "With  the  Coliseum  he  was  also  greatly  impressed. 
It  seemed  to  him  as  majestic  and  impressive  in  its  utter  deso- 
lation as  it  ever  could  have  been  in  in  its  grandeur  and  glory. 
He  says: 

"  We  were  fortunate  in  the  hour  of  our  visit.  As  we  slowly  made  the 
circuit  of  the  edifice,  a  body  of  French  cavalry  were  exercising  their 
horses  along  the  eastern  side  of  it,  while  at  a  little  distance,  in  the  grove 
or  garden  at  the  south,  the  quick  rattle  of  the  drum  told  of  the  evolutions 
of  infantry.  At  length  the  horsemen  rode  slowly  away  to  the  southward, 
and  our  attention  was  drawn  to  certain  groups  of  Italians  in  the  interior, 
who  were  slowly  marching  and  chanting.  We  entered,  and  were  witnesses 
of  a  strange,  impressive  ceremony.  It  is  among  the  traditions  of  Rome 


A  8INGULAE   CEREMONY.  251 

fliat  a  great  number  of  the  early  Christians  were  compelled  by  their 
heathen  persecutors  to  fight  and  die  here  as  gladiators,  as  a  punishment 
for  their  contumacious,  treasonable  resistance  to  the  '  lower  law '  then  in 
the  ascendant,  which  the  high  priests  and  circuit  judges  of  that  day  were 
wont  in  their  sermons  and  charges  to  demonstrate  that  every  one  was 
bound  as  a  law-abiding  citizen  to  obey,  no  matter  what  might  be  his  pri- 
vate, personal  convictions  with  regard  to  it.  Since  the  Coliseum  has  been 
cleared  of  rubbish,  fourteen  little  oratories  or  places  of  prayer  have  been 
cheaply  constructed  around  its  inner  circumference,  and  here  at  certain 
seasons  prayers  are  offered  for  the  eternal  bliss  of  the  martyred  Christians 
of  the  Coliseum.  These  prayers  were  being  offered  on  this  occasion. 
Twenty  or  thirty  men  (priests  or  monks  I  inferred),  partly  bare-headed, 
but  as  many  with  their  heads  completely  covered  by  hooded  cloaks, 
which  left  only  two  small  holes  for  the  eyes,  accompanied  by  a  large  num. 
ber  of  women,  marched  slowly  and  sadly  to  one  oratory,  chanting  a  prayer 
by  the  way,  setting  up  their  lighted  tapers  by  its  semblance  of  an  altar, 
kneeling  and  praying  for  some  minutes,  then  rising  and  proceeding  to  the 
next  oratory,  and  so  on  until  they  had  repeated  the  service  before  every 
one.  They  all  seemed  to  be  of  the  poorer  class,  and  I  presume  the  cere- 
mony is  often  repeated  or  the  participators  would  have  been  much  more 
numerous.  The  praying  was  fervent  and  I  trust  excellent,  —  as  the  music 
decidedly  was  not ;  but  the  whole  scene,  with  the  setting  sun  shining  redly 
through  the  shattered,  arches  and  upon  the  ruined  wall,  with  a  few  French 
soldiers  standing  heedlessly  by,  was  strangely  picturesque,  and  to  me  affect, 
ing.  I  came  away  before  it  concluded,  to  avoid  the  damp  night-air;  but 
many  checkered  years  and  scenes  of  stirring  interest  must  intervene  to 
efface  from  my  memory  that  sun-set  and  those  strange  prayers  in  the  Coli 
seum." 

He  paid  several  visits  to  the  Vatican  with  which  he  was 
greatly  pleased,  but  failed  to  see  some  of  the  most  precious 
works  of  art  which  are  there  preserved,  whereupon,  he  wished 
"  the  Papal  government  would  frankly  exact,  as  I  for  one 
would  most  cheerfully  pay.  a  fair  price  for  admission  to  the 
most  admirable  and  unrivalled  collections  which  are  its  prop- 
erty." He  expressed  unbounded  admiration  of  the  princely 
families  of  Rome,  whose  palaces  and  immense  collections  of 
paintings  and  sculptures  are  almost  daily  open  to  strangers 
without  charge,  save  the  trifle  that  you  choose  to  give  the 
attendant  who  shows  you  through  them.  "  What  American," 
he  asks,  "  ever  thought  of  spending  half  an  immense  fortune 
in  the  collection  of  magnificent  galleries  ot  pictures,  statues, 
etc.,  and  then  quietly  opening  the  whole  to  the  public  without 
expecting  a  word  of  compliment  or  acknowledgement  in  re 


252  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GREELEY. 

turn?  —  Without  being  personally  known  to  those  whom  he 
thus  benefitted?  We  have  something  to  learn  of  Rome  in  this 
respect." 

The  common  people  of  Rome  seemed  to  Mr.  Greeley  to  be 
an  intelligent,  vivacious  race,  and  he  credited  the  opinion  that 
they  were  mentally  superior  to  most  other  Italians.  He  rarely 
met  a  face  indicating  mental  imbecility,  or  even  low  mediocrity 
among  the  Romans.  The  women  did  not  dress  well,  he 
observed,  but  were  ready  at  repartee,  self-possessed,  energetic, 
with  flashing  eyes  and  countenances  often  indicating  a  depth 
of  emotion  and  character.  He  did  not  think  such  pictures  as 
abound  in  Rome  could  have  been  painted  where  the  women 
were  common-place  and  unideal.  But  he  had  an  unfavourable 
opinion  of  the  moral  qualities  of  the  Romans,  including 
therein  patriotism  and  all  the  civic  virtues.  He  thought  they 
were  quite  commonly  sensual,  selfish,  indolent,  fickle,  dishon- 
est, vicious.  Their  want  of  genuine  religious  and  civic  virtues 
he  attributed  to  the  unfavourable  operation  of  "religious 
machinery,"  and  execrable  civil  government.  Such  a  thing  as 
enterprise,  he  said,  is  utterly  unknown  south  of  Genoa. 

From  Rome  Mr.  Greeley  proceeded  to  Venice,  by  Civita 
Vecchia,  thence  by  sea  to  Leghorn,  and  then  by  Florence, 
Bologna,  Ferrera,  and  Padua.  His  stay  in  Florence  was  brief, 
and  he  spent  most  of  the  time,  under  guidance  of  good  Amer- 
ican friends,  in  looking  through  the  galleries  devoted  to  paint- 
ings and  statuary  in  the  two  famous  palaces  of  the  reigning 
family  and  in  the  Academy.  His  expectations  were  not  fully 
realized,  —  a  fact  which  he  attributed  to  late  illness  at  sea  and 
his  recent  acquaintance  with  the  immense  and  multiform  treas- 
ures of  art  at  Rome.  But  he  found  no  such  exquisite  pleasure 
at  R  >me  as  he  derived  from  the  hour  he  spent  in  the  studio  of 
the  distinguished  American  sculptor,  Hiram  Powers.  "I 
defy,"  he  exclaims,  "  antiquity  to  surpass  —  I  doubt  its  ability 
to  rival  —  his  '  Proserpine '  and  his  'Psyche'  with  any  mod- 
els of  the  female  head  that  have  come  down  to  us;  and  while 
I  do  not  see  how  they  could  be  excelled  in  their  own  sphere,  I 
feel  that  Powers,  unlike  Alexander,  has  still  realms  to  conquer, 
and  will  fulfil  his  destiny."  He  also  saw  Hart,  Gait,  and 


AN   ADVENTURE.  253 

Rogers.  Greenough  lie  had  previously  met  at  Turin  on  his 
way  to  America.  Of  American  painters,  he  met  only  Page. 
Hastening  onward  he  crossed  the  Apennines  mainly  in  the 
night.  They  seemed  to  him  a  little  higher  than  the  Green 
Mountains  of  Vermont,  though  they  were  far  more  precipitous 
and  sterile.  Passing  out  of  Tuscany  into  the  Papal  territory 
again,  all  the  baggage  had  to  be  overhauled,  and  passports 
re-scrutinized  —  "two  processes,"  he  says,  "to  which  I  am 
becoming  more  accustomed  than  any  live  eel  ever  was  to  being 
skinned.  The  time  consumed  was  but  an  hour  and  the  pecu- 
niary swindle  trilling."  The  only  thing  he  saw  at  Bologna,  to 
extract  a  practical  remark  from,  was  an  awning  of  sheeting  or 
calico  spread  over  the  centre  of  the  main  street  on  a  level  with 
the  roofs  of  the  houses  for  the  distance  of  half  a  mile  or  more. 
He  distrusted  its  standing  a  strong  gust,  but  if  it  would, 
thought  the  idea  worth  borrowing.  The  chief  business  of 
Bologna  seemed  to  be  "  watching  gates  and  visaing  passports." 
From  Bologna  to  Padua  by  diligence,  with  plenty  of  stupid 
stoppages  and  temptations  to  use  the  energetic  idmm.  He 
thought  the  diligence  travelling  in  Italy  must  have  been 
organized  "  on  purpose  to  afford  the  least  possible  accommoda- 
tion at  the  most  exorbitant  cost."  An  amusing  incident  of 
the  journey  between  Bologna  and  Venice  is  thus  related: 

"As  midnight  drew  on,  I  grew  weary  of  gazing  at  the  same  endless 
diversity  of  grain-fields,  vineyards,  rows  of  trees,  etc.,  though  the  bright 
moon  was  now  shining;  and,  shutting  out  the  chill  night-air,  I  disposed 
myself  on  my  old  great-coat  and  softest  carpet-bag  for  a  drowse,  having 
ample  room  at  my  command  if  I  could  but  have  brought  it  into  a  straight 
line.  But  the  road  was  hard,  the  coach  a  little  the  uneasiest  I  ever 
hardened  my  bones  upon,  and  my  slumber  was  of  a  disturbed  and  dubious 
character,  a  dim  sense  of  physical  discomfort  shaping  and  colouring  my 
incoherent  and  fitful  visions.  For  a  time  I  fancied  myself  held  down  on 
my  back  while  some  malevolent  wretch  drenched  the  floor  (and  me)  with 
filthy  water;  then  I  was  in  a  rude  scuffle,  and  came  out  third  or  fourth 
best,  with  my  clothes  badly  torn ;  anon  I  had  lost  my  hat  in  a  strange 
place,  and  could  not  begin  to  find  it!  and  at  last  my  clothes  were  full  of 
grasshoppers  and  spiders,  who  were  beguiling  their  leisure  by  biting  and 
stinging  me.  The  misery  at  last  became  unbearable  and  I  awoke.  But 
where?  I  was  plainly  in  a  tight,  dark  box  that  needed  more  air;  I  soon 
recollected  that  it  was  a  stage-coach,  wherein  I  had  been  making  my  \\  ay 
from  Ferrara  to  Padua.  I  threw  open  the  door  and  looked  out.  Horses, 


254  LIFE  OF   IIOKACE  GEEELEY. 

postilions,  and  guard  were  all  gone ;  the  moon,  the  fields,  the  road  were 
gone:  I  was  in  a  close  court-yard,  alone  with  Night  and  Silence;  but 
where  ?  A  church  clock  struck  three ;  but  it  was  only  promised  that  we 
should  reach  Padua  by  four,  and  I,  making  the  usual  discount  on  suck 
promises,  had  set  down  five  as  the  probable  hour  of  our  arrival.  I  got  out 
to  take  a  more  deliberate  survey,  and  the  tall  form  and  bright  bayonet  o* 
an  Austrian  sentinel,  standing  guard  over  the  egress  of  the  court-yard 
were  before  me.  To  talk  German  was  beyond  the  sweep  of  my  dizzies 
ambition,  but  an  Italian  runner  or  porter  instantly  presented  himsell 
From  him  I  made  out  that  I  was  in  Padua  of  ancient  and  learned  renown 
and  that  the  first  train  for  Venice  would  not  start  for  three  hours  yet.  > 
followed  him  into  a  convenient  ca//,  which  was  all  open  and  well  lighted 
where  I  ordered  a  cup  of  chocolate,  and  proceeded  leisurly  to  discuss  it 
When  I  had  finished,  the  other  guests  had  all  gone  out,  but  daylight  was 
coming  in,  and  I  began  to  feel  more  at  home.  The  cafi  tender  was  asleep 
in  his  chair;  the  porter  had  gone  off;  the  sentinel  alone  kept  awake  ofi 
his  post.  Soon  the  welcome  face  of  the  coach-guard,  whom  I  had  borne 
company  from  Bologna,  appeared ;  I  hailed  him,  obtained  my  baggage, 
hired  a  porter,  and,  having  nothing  more  to  wait  for,  started  at  a  little 
past  four  for  the  Railroad  station,  nearly  a  mile  distant;  taking  observa- 
tions as  I  went.  Arrived  at  the  d£pot,  I  discharged  my  porter,  sat  down 
and  waited  for  the  place  to  open,  with  ample  leisure  for  reflection.  At 
Biz  o'clock  I  felt  once  more  the  welcome  motion  of  a  railroad  car,  and  at 
eight  was  in  Venice." 

If  Mr.  Greeley  had  been  delighted  with  the  valley  of  the  Po> 
a  great  portion  of  which  he  had  now  traversed,  he  was  enrap 
tured  with  Venice.  "Venice!"  he  exclaims.  "Queen  of  the 
Adriatic!  'City  of  the  Heart!'  how  can  I  ever  forget  thee? 
Brief,  too  brief  was  my  halt  amid  thy  glorious  structures,  but 
such  eras  are  measured  not  by  hours,  but  by  sensations;  and 
my  first  day  in  Venice  must  ever  hold  its  place  among  the 
most  cherished  recollections  of  my  .life."  Every  tourist  falls 
in  love  with  Venice,  and,  as  is  the  case  quite  generally  in  the 
matter  of  falling  in  love,  very  few  can  give  satisfactory 
accounts  of  the  phenomenon.  A  most  charming  time  did  Mr. 
Greeley  have  in  Venice,  ever  under  the  resistless  fascination ; 
but,  having  left  the  presence  of  the  charmer,  he  returned  to 
his  philosophy  and  wrote: 

"  Full  of  interest  as  is  everything  in  Venice,  I  do  not  remembfv  to  have 
detected  there  the  effectual  working  of  a  single  idea  of  the  last  century, 
save  in  the  railroad,  which  barely  touches  without  enlivening  her.  the 
solitary  steamboat  belonging  to  Trieste,  and  two  or  three  larger  gondola* 


UPSET  !  255 

marked  '  Omnibus '  this  or  that,  which  appeared  to  be  conveying  good 
loads  of  passengers  from  one  end  of  the  city  to  the  other  for  one-sixth  or 
eighth  of  the  price  which  the  same  journey  solus  cost  me.  The  omnibus 
typifies  Association — the  simple  but  grandly  fruitful  idea  which  is  des- 
tined to  renovate  the  world  of  industry  and  production,  substituting 
abundance  and  comfort  for  penury  and  misery.  For  man,  I  trust,  this 
quickening  word  is  yet  seasonable;  for  Venice  it  is  too  late.  It  is  far 
easier  to  found  two  new  cities  than  to  restore  one  dead  one.  Fallen  Queen 
of  the  Adriatic !  a  long  and  mournful  adieu  1" 

From  Venice  Mr.  Greeley  returned  to  London  by  Milan, 
crossing  the  Alps  by  the  pass  of  St.  Gothard,  Lucerne,  Basle, 
Cologne,  Brussels,  arid  Paris,  being  less  than  a  fortnight  on 
the  whole  journey,  but  writing  instructive  and  eminently 
practical  letters  to  The  Tribune  in  description  of  Lombardy, 
Switzerland,  a  portion  of  Germany,  Belgium,  and  Northeastern 
Franca  American  agriculture,  he  asserted,  had  just  two  arts 
to  learn  from  Lombardy — irrigation  and  tree-planting.  And 
he  proceeded  to  demonstrate  his  proposition  very  much  as 
though  he  were  delivering  a  capital  agricultural  address  at  an 
American  State  Fair.  But  then,  on  the  other  hand,  he  thought 
one  of  Italy's  great  wants  was  a  good  deal  of  sub-soil  plough- 
ing on  the  American  plan.  Switzerland,  he  averred,  could  not 
afford  to  be  a  Kingdom, — the  expense  of  a  Court  and  Royal 
Family  would  famish  her  people.  Yet  everywhere  he  saw 
frugal  thrift  and  homely  content,  and  only  two  beggars  during 
his  journey  through  the  country.  Descending  the  Alps  at  the 
usual  rapid  rate,  the  diligence  upset.  The  incident  is  thus 
related: 

"I  was  just  thinking  that  though  every  one  should  know  his  own 
business  best,  yet  if  I  wore  to  drive  down  a  steep  mountain  in  that  way  I 
should  expect  to  break  my  neck,  and  suspect  I  deserved  it,  when,  as  we 
turned  a  sharp  zig-zag  on  a  steep  grade  at  a  stiff  trot,  our  carriage  tilted, 
and  over  she  went  in  a  twinkling.  Our  horses  behaved  admirably,  which 
in  an  upset  is  always  half  the  battle.  Had  they  started,  the  diligence 
managers  could  only  have  rendered  a  flemish  account  of  that  load.  As  it 
was  they  stopped,  and  the  driver,  barely  scratched,  had  them  in  hand  in  a 
minute.  I  was  on  the  box  seat  with  him  and  fell  under  him,  catching  a 
bad  strain  of  the  left  wrist  on  which  I  came  down,  which  disables  that 
hand  for  a  few  days — nothing  broken  and  no  great  harm  done.  But  I 
should  judge  that  our  heads  lay  about  three  feet  from  the  side  of  the  road, 
which  was  a  precipice  of  not  more  than  twenty  feet,  but  the  rocks  below 


256  LDTE  OF   HOHACE   GREELEY. 

particularly  jagged  and  uninviting.  Our  four  inside  passengers  had  been 
a  good  deal  mixed  up,  in  the  concussion,  but  soon  began  to  emerge 
neriatim,  from  the  side  door  which  in  the  fall  came  uppermost — only  one 
of  them  much  hurt,  and  he  by  a  bruise  or  gash  on  the  head  nowise  dan- 
gerous. Each,  as  his  or  her  head  protruded  through  the  aperture,  began 
to  'let  in'  on  the  driver,  whose  real  fault  was  that  of  following  bad 
examples.  I  was  a  little  riled  at  first  myself,  but  the  second  and  last  lady 
who  came  out  put  me  in  excellent  humour.  She  was  not  hurt,  but  had 
her  new  silk  umbrella  broken  square  in  two,  and  she  flashed  the  pieces 
before  the  delinquent's  eyes  and  reeled  off  the  High  Dutch  to  him  with 
vehement  volubility.  I  wished  I  could  have  understood  her  more  pre- 
cisely. Though  not  more  than  eighteen,  she  developed  a  tongue  that 
•would  have  done  credit  to  forty." 

Mr.  Greeley  had  often  met  Germans,  of  course,  but  thought 
they  were  seen  to  the  best  advantage  at  home.  He  heartily 
acknowledged  their  uniform  courtesy  ("  save  in  the  detestable 
habit  of  smoking  "),  and  was  greatly  pleased  with  the  deference 
of  members  of  the  same  family  to  each  other.  "  The  Swiss," 
he  observed,  "  are  freemen,  and  wear  the  fact  unconsciously 
but  palpably  on  their  brows  and  beaming  from  their  eyes.  The 
Germans  submit  passively  to  arbitrary  power  which  they  see 
not  how  successfully  to  resist,  but  they  render  to  rank  or  dig- 
nity no  more  homage  than  is  necessary — their  souls  are  still 
free,  and  their  manners  evince  a  simplicity  and  frankness  which 
might  shame  or  at  least  instruct  America." 

Mr.  Greeley  had  but  a  short  stay  in  Belgium.  "Writing  of 
it,  he  speaks  of  the  state  of  agriculture;  women  working  in 
the  fields;  radical  railroads,  etc.;  but  not  a  word  of  Waterloo, 
which  was  then  overdone  into  a  very  dry  crisp.  His  route 
from  Paris  to  London  was  by  Rouen  and  Dieppe,  instead  of  by 
Calais.  But  the  trip  across  the  Channel  was  even  more  dis- 
agreeable than  the  former  one,  and  the  wretched  boats  came  in 
for  a  heavy  discharge  of  execration.  From  Paris  he  wrote  of 
the  expected  defeat  of  Louis  Napoleon's  reelection,  therein 
misjudging  the  situation. 

When  he  reached  London,  the  Universal  Peace  Congress  was 
in  session,  largely  attended  by  delegates,  among  them  many 
men  of  distinguished  renown.  Mr.  Greeley  had  great  respect 
for  the  cause,  but  could  not  help  thinking  there  would  have  to 
be  some  more  hard  fighting  before  it  could  prevail. 


THE  ENGLISH   PEOPLE.  257 

Before  returning  to  America,  he  visited  Scotland  and  Ire- 
land, but  had  not  much  time  to  spend  in  either  of  those 
countries.  He  was  especially  pleased  with  Edinburgh.  He 
"never  saw  so  many  good  houses  with  so  few  indifferent;" 
but  he  spent  most  time  of  all  in  the  Palace  of  Holyrood, 
"  which,  though  unwisely  located,  never  gorgeously  furnished 
and  long  since  abandoned  of  Royalty  to  dilapidation  and  decay> 
still  wears  the  stamp  of  majesty  and  will  be  regal  even  when 
crumbled  into  ruins."  Of  course,  like  all  other  generoua 
souls,  which  are  inevitably  captivated  even  by  the  memory  of 
female  loveliness,  he  passed  into  heroics  when  speaking  of 
Mary  Queen  of  Scots. 

From  Edinburgh,  he  went  to  Glasgow,  which  he  describes 
as  more  American  than  any  other  city  he  had  seen  in  Europe ; 
thence  by  the  Clyde  to  Greenock,  and  from  there  across  the 
North  Channel  to  Belfast,  Ireland.  He  only  had  a  few  days 
in  Ireland.  He  visited  Dublin,  Galway,  and  Limerick,  but  did 
not  have  time  to  see  Cork.  His  observations  upon  the  sad 
condition  of  Ireland  were  intended  to  be  of  practical-  value. 
He  thought  the  country  should  have  a  Parliament  of  its  own; 
that  the  customs  of  land-tenantry  were  vicious  and  ruinous; 
that  nowhere  on  earth  could  more  good  be  accomplished  than 
by  the  establishment  of  manufactures,  the  building  of  rail- 
ways, and  advancing  the  price  of  Labour.  He  manifested 
deep  interest  in  Galway,  trusting  "  that  a  new  Liverpool  is 
soon  to  arise  here;  and  that,  should  I  ever  again  visit  Europe, 
I  shall  first  land  on  the  quay  of  Galway." 

Perhaps  the  candour  of  Mr.  Greeley,  though  often  exhibited 
in  the  most  admirable  manner,  was  never  more  finely  illus- 
trated than  in  his  expression  of  opinion  of  the  English  people, 
some  of  whose  representative  men  and  journals  had  treated 
him  unjustly  and  discourteously.  He  says: 

"I  do  not  wholly  like  these  cold  and  stately  English,  yet  I  think  I  am 
not  blind  to  their  many  sterling  qualities.  The  greatness  of  England,  it 
is  quite  confidently  asserted,  is  based  upon  her  conquests  and  plunder- 
ings — on  her  immense  commerce  and  unlimited  foreign  possessions.  I 
think  otherwise.  The  English  have  qualities  which  would  have  rendered 
them  wealthy  and  powerful  though  they  had  been  located  in  the  centre 
of  Asia  instead  of  on  the  western  coast  of  Europe.  I  do  not  say  that  these 
17 


258  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELET. 

qualities  could  have  been  developed  in  Central  Asia,  but  if  they  Jiad  been, 
they  would  have  insured  to  their  possessors  a  commanding  position. 
Personally,  the  English  do  not  attract  nor  shine ;  but  collectively  they  are 
a  race  to  make  their  mark  on  the  destinies  of  mankind." 

Their  distinguishing  characteristics,  he  thought,  were  indus- 
triousness,  method,  economy,  practicality,  benevolence,  gravity. 
Of  English  women,  he  spoke  with  discriminate  praise.  They 
avoided  peculiarity  of  apparel  or  speech,  but  were  unsurpassed 
in  physical  development,  and  were  about  the  best  mothers  on 
earth.  Against  the  good  qualities  the  English  set  off  some 
disagreeable  ones — awkwardness ;  too  sharp  an  eye  to  business, 
whereby  courtesy  is  destroyed;  overweening  self-conceit.  Yet 
the  better  qualities,  he  thought,  decidedly  preponderate.  They 
naturally  love  justice,  manly  dealing,  fair  play;  and  though 
cold  and  even  repulsive  out-of-doors,  the  Englishman  is  tender 
and  truthful  in  his  home. 

He  took  passage  for  New-York  on  the  same  steamer  by 
which  he  had  crossed  the  ocean  in  April,  embarking  at  Liver- 
pool on  the  6th  of  August,  having  been  absent  from  home  not 
quite  four  months.  On  shipboard,  in  the  harbour  of  the 
commercial  mart,  he  finished  his  last  letter  from  Europe, 
concluding: 


e ' 


"  But  I  must  not  linger.  The  order  to  embark  is  given;  our  good  ship 
Baltic  is  ready ;  another  hour  and  I  shall  have  left  England  and  this  con- 
tinent, probably  forever.  With  a  fervent  good-bye  to  the  friends  I  leave 
on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic,  I  turn  my  steps  gladly  and  proudly  toward 
my  own  loved  Western  home — toward  the  land  wherein  Man  enjoys  larger 
opportunities  than  elsewhere  to  develop  the  better  and  the  worse  aspects 
of  his  nature,  and  where  evil  and  good  have  .a  freer  course,  a  wider  arena 
for  their  inevitable  struggles,  than  is  allowed  them  among  the  heavy 
fetters  and  cast-iron  forms  of  this  rigid  and  wrinkled  Old  World.  Doubt- 
less, those  struggles  will  long  be  arduous  and  trying ;  doubtless,  the  dic- 
tates of  duty  will  there  often  bear  sternly  away  from  the  halcyon  bowers 
of  popularity;  doubtless,  he  who  would  be  singly  and  wholly  right  must 
there  encounter  ordeals  as  severe  as  these  which  here  try  the  souls  of  the 
would-be  champions  of  progress  and  liberty.  But  political  freedom,  such 
as  white  men  enjoy  in  the  United  States,  and  the  mass  do  not  enjoy  in 
Europe,  not  even  in  Britain,  is  a  basis  for  confident  and  well-grounded 
hope;  the  running  stream,  though  turbid,  tends  ever  to  self-purification, 
the  obstructed,  stagnant  pool  grows  daily  more  dank  and  loathsome. 
Believing  most  firmly  in  the  ultimate  triumph  of  Good  over  Evil,  I  rejoice 


HOME   AGAIN.  259 

In  the  existence  and  diffusion  of  that  liberty,  which,  while  it  intensifies 
thr>  contest,  accelerates  the  consummation.  Neither  blind  to  her  errors, 
noi  a  panderer  to  her  vices,  I  rejoice  to  feel  that  every  hour  henceforth  till 
I  see  her  shores  must  lessen  the  distance  which  divides  me  from  my 
country,  whose  advantages  and  blessings  this  four  months'  absence  has 
taught  me  to  appreciate  more  dearly  and  to  prize  more  deeply  than  before. 
With  a  glow  of  unwonted  rapture  I  see  our  stately  vessel's  prow  turned 
toward  the  setting  sun,  and  strive  to  realize  that  only  some  ten  days 
separate  me  from  those  I  know  and  love  best  on  earth.  Hark !  the  last 
gun  announces  that  the  mail-boat  has  left  us,  and  that  we  are  fairly  afloat 
on  our  ocean  journey ;  the  shores  of  Europe  recede  from  our  vision ;  the 
watery  waste  is  all  around  us;  and  now,  with  God  above  and  Death 
below,  our  gallant  bark  and  her  clustered  company  together  brave  the 
dangers  of  the  mighty  deep.  May  Infinite  Mercy  watch  over  our  onward 
path  and  bring  us  safely  to  our  several  homes ;  for  to  die  away  from  home 
and  kindred  seems  one  of  the  saddest  calamities  that  could  befall  me. 
This  mortal  tenement  would  rest  uneasily  in  an  ocean  shroud ;  this  spirit 
reluctantly  resign  that  tenement  to  the  chill  and  pitiless  brine;  these  eyes 
close  regretfully  on  the  stranger  skies  and  bleak  inhospitality  of  the  sullen 
and  stormy  main.  No !  let  me  see  once  more  the  scenes  so  well  remem- 
bered and  beloved ;  let  me  grasp,  if  but  once  again,  the  hand  of  Friend- 
ship,  and  hear  the  thrilling  accents  of  proud  Affection,  and  when  sooner 
or  later  the  hour  of  mortal  agony  shall  come,  let  my  last  gaze  be  fixed  on 
eyes  that  will  not  forget  me  when  I  am  gone,  and  let  my  ashes  repose  in 
that  congenial  soil  which,  however  I  may  there  be  esteemed  or  hated, 
is  still 

4  My  own  green  land  forever.'  " 


CHAPTEE   XV. 

ON  THE  PLATFORM— REVISITS  EUROPE. 

Mr.  Greelcy  On  the  Platform  —  Ills  First  Lecture:  "Human  Life"  —  His 
Style  of  Public  Speaking  —  Publishes  a  Volume  of  Lectures  and  Es- 
says, Entitled  "  Hints  Towards  Reforms "  —  Declines  to  Address  a 
Literary  Society  —  Characteristic  Letter — A  Letter  Misinterpreted  — 
Does  Not  "Fail  to  Connect" — Agricultural  Addresses  —  The  Indiana 
Agricultural  Fair  of  1853 — Mr.  Greeley 's  Address — A  Night  Ride 
on  a  Hand-car — Revisits  Europe  —  Several  Weeks  of  Leisure — Two 
Days  in  a  French  Prison  —  His  Amusing  Account  of  His  Incarceration 
—  Switzerland  and  the  Glaciers  —  A  Presentiment — Return  to  America. 

HORACE  GREELEY  early  entered  the  lecture  field.  The  plat- 
form became  a  means  of  influence  and  of  profit  about  cotem- 
poraneously  with  his  rising  fame.  He  appears  to  have  taken 
advantage  of  it  rather  to  extend  his  usefulness  than  to  increase 
his  income  or  his  reputation.  He  chose  topics  of  a  practical 
nature,  and  discussed  them  in  a  practical  manner,  his  chief 
ambition  being  to  interest  the  public  in  behalf  of  Labour  and 
to  devise  ways  and  means  tor  its  elevation  and  honour.  His 
first  lecture  was  delivered  on  January  3d,  1843.  It  is  thua 
announced  in  The  Tribune: 

Horace  Greeley  will  lecture  before  the  New- York  Lyceum  at  the  Taber- 
nacle, this  evening.  Subject,  "  Human  Life!"  The  lecture  will  commence 
at  half  past  7,  precisely.  If  those  who  care  to  hear  it  will  sit  near  the 
desk,  they  will  favour  the  lecturer's  weak  and  husky  voice. 

The  Tabernacle  was  admirably  designed  as  a  place  for  public 
speaking.  A  large,  circular  building,  with  slanting  floor,  and 
galleries  rising,  one  above  another,  nearly  to  the  ceiling,  it 
would  seat  some  three  thousand  persons  in  plain  view  and 
easy  hearing  distance  of  the  speaker.  At  the  appointed  time, 
Mr.  Greeley  appeared,  and  making  his  way  to  the  platform, 
looked  over  the  audience,  which  did  not  crowd  the  auditorium, 
wi  th  his  benignant  expression.  There  was  momentary  applause, 


FIRST  LECTURE.  2C1 

after  which  in  his  thin,  though  penetrating  voice,  he  began: 
"  To  the  piercing  gaze  of  an  unfettered  spirit,  unmindful  of 
space,  which  should  scan  it  from  the  central  orb  of  our  system, 
this  fair  globe  must  afford  a  spectacle  of  strange  magnifi- 
cence and  beauty.  Rolling  on,  ever  on,  in  her  appointed 
round,  the  earth  must  present  new  scenes  of  interest  and 
grandeur  with  every  hour  of  her  revolving  progress:  now  the 
swarming  vales  of  China  and  Japan,  the  sultry  plains  of  India, 
with  its  tiger-hunted  jungles,  relieved  by  the  gaunt,  bleak 
piles  of  the  Himmalehs,  piercing  the  very  skies  with  their 
pinnacles  of  eternal  rock  and  ice;  then  appear  the  more  allur- 
ing and  variegated  glades  of  southern  and  middle  Europe,  and 
with  them  the  scorched  and  glowing  deserts  of  Africa,  shining 
in  silvery  worthlessness  and  desolation.  The  broad,  green  belt 
of  the  billowy  Atlantic  now  unfolds  itself,  and  then  appears 
the  deeper  green  of  this  immense  luxuriant  forest,  America, 
with  the  achievements  of  three  centuries  of  advancing,  strug- 
gling civilization,  barely  sufficing  to  dot  irregularly  its  eastern 
border,  and  hardly  equalling  in  extent  those  prairie  openings 
in  its  centre  which  nature,  or  rather  the  Red  Man's  annual 
conflagration,  has  sufficed  through  many  ages  to  hollow  out  by 
imperceptible  gradations.  From  amid  the  all-embracing 
foliage  shine  forth  with  steady  radiance,  with  deep  serenity, 
the  mirror-like  surfaces  of  the  Great  Lakes — the  last  surpassing 
in  size,  profundity,  and  beauty — the  slender  threads  of  the 
Father  of  Waters  and  his"  far-stretching  tributaries  are  seen 
disparting  vales  whose  exuberant  fertility  has  known  no  par- 
allel since  Eden;  while  farther  on  the  temendous  chains  of  the 
Andes,  the  Rocky  Mountains  heave  up  their  scathed  and 
rugged  sides  through  the  surrounding  seas  of  verdure,  as  if  in 
grim  and  haughty  defiance  to  the  utmost  fury  of  the  lightning 
and  the  hurricane,  or  in  scornful  exultation  over  the  crouching 
world  at  their  feet.  Soon  the  broad,  placid  surface  of  the  vast, 
unvexed  Pacific  presents  itself  sprinkled  with  isles  of  deepest 
emerald  where  flowers  perennial  bloom.  And  still  the  earth 
rolls  on,  and  every  hour  shall  bring  to  view  fresh  marvels  to 
awaken  the  soul  to  a  consciousness  of  the  Infinite,  to  deepen 
the  fervour  of  piety,  and  exalt  the  glory  of  the  Great  Supreme. 


262  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GKEELET. 

"  Yet  beyond  doubt,  the  central  figure  of  this  vast  -wonder- 
work of  creation,  around  which  all  other  entities  and  seem  ings 
cluster  and  revolve,  is  MAN.  He  is  the  presiding  genius — the 
lord  of  the  heritage.  It  is  his  presence  which  gives  signifi- 
cance and  interest  to  the  landscapes,  which  elevates  fertility 
and  beauty  above  barrenness  and  decay." 

Such  were  the  opening  sentences  of  Horace  Greeley's  first 
lecture.  "  Give  me  a  cup  of  sack,"  says  Falstaffr  "  to  make 
mine  eyes  look  red,  that  it  may  be  thought  I  have  wept;  for 
I  must  speak  in  passion,  and  I  will  do  it  in  king  Cambyses' 
vein."  It  is  difficult  to  imagine  Horace  Greeley  starting  forth 
in  those  paths  of  flowery  display.  And  yet  a  lecture  may  be 
highly  meritorious,  as  spoken,  and  not  elicit  unmixed  admira- 
tion when  read.  "Does  it  read  well?"  Fox  used  to  ask  when 
one  praised  a  speech.  "  Yes."  "  Then,"  he  would  say,  "  it 
was  not  a  good  speech."  The  voice,  the  associations,  the  want 
of  time  to  stop  and  criticise,  give  to  spoken  essays  a  character 
wholly  different  from  that  which  belongs  to  those  intended 
only  to  be  read.  In  this  instance,  the  lecturer  became  less 
stilted  as  he  proceeded.  He  designed  to  show  that  human  life 
was  capable  of  more  goodness  and  greatness,  in  individuals, 
and  in  the  race,  than  was  commonly  supposed,  and  in  order 
that  the  most  might  be  made  of  life,  sundry  reforms  for  the 
elevation  of  the  minds  of  the  people  were  necessary.  He 
concluded: 

« 

Such  thoughts  as  these  are  already  familiar  to  many  generous  hearts, 
and  the  number  is  daily  increasing.  Let  us  not  fear  that  they  will  long 
remain  unacted. 

Let  none  accuse  me  of  the  enthusiast's  common  error — the  presumption 
that  the  world  is  to  be  transformed  in  a  day.  I  know  well  how  great  the 
interval  which  ever  divides  the  perception  of  a  noble  idea  by  a  few  earnest 
minds  from  its  hearty  acceptance,  its  practical  realization,  by  the  great 
mass  of  mankind.  I  know  how  any  such  idea  must  ever  suffer  from  the 
errors  or  imperfections  of  its  apostles,  from  the  faithlessness  of  the  selfish 
and  undiscerning,  from  its  perversion  and  corruption  by  many  on  whom  it 
makes  an  impression.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  I  will  not  close  my  eyes  to 
the  decided  progress  which  Society  has  made  during  the  last  two  centuries, 
nor  to  the  direction  of  that  progress.  When  I  perceive  that  unity  of  effort, 
resting  on  community  of  interest,  has  checkered  Christendom  with  roads, 
bridges,  canals,  railroads,  and  before  unimagincd  facilities  for  the  inter- 


ON  THE  PLATFORM.  263 

change  of  products  and  of  thought;  when  I  see  Universal  Education,  so 
recently  regarded  as  a  benevolent  chimera,  now  admitted  in  theory  to  be 
essential  and  attainable,  though  but  distantly  approached  in  practice; 
when  I  find  the  right  of  the  destitute  to  a  support  at  the  public  expense 
admitted  and  acted  upon — blindly,  imperfectly,  if  you  please,  but  still  at 
so  serious  a  cost  and  with  such  a  uniformity  both  in  time  and  space  as  to 
forbid  the  idea  that  it  rests  on  any  other  foundation  than  that  of  acknowl- 
edged and  imperative  duty ;  when  I  consider  that  so  few  generations  have 
passed  since  the  ignorant  and  the  destitute  were  left  to  live  in  darkness 
and  die  by  unheeded  famine,  no  man  questioning  its  rightfulness,  and  the 
learned,  the  affluent,  the  noble  blasphemously  pronouncing  all  this  the 
order  of  Providence! — I  will  not  doubt  that  all  these  meliorations  of  the 
hard  lot  of  the  unfortunate  are  but  slight  precursors  of  the  vast  Reform 
which  is  yet  to  embosom  all  other  reforms — which  is  to  secure  Education 
and  Bread  even  to  the  deepest  poverty  and  darkest  misfortune,  by  simply 
making  the  sinews,  the  exertions,  of  any  intelligent  child  of  Adam  worth 
the  cost  of  his  instruction  and  subsistence — which  shall  replace  all  our 
miserable  and  too  often  pernicious  public  and  private  alms  to  the  vigour- 
ous,  by  a  system  of  undegrading  and  self-sustaining  General  Industry,  in 
which  a  place  shall  be  open  to  every  one  who  needs  or  asks  it. 

Happy  he  who  shall  be  enabled  to  show  forth  in  his  own  what  human 
life  should  be,  unpolluted  by  evil  passions,  uncorroded  by  sordid  cares, 
unchafed  by  the  disappointment  of  selfish  aspirations,  ever  shielded  from 
the  access  of  temptation  and  error  by  finding  delight  in  duty,  and  a  tran- 
quil joy  in  the  widest  diffusion  of  blessings.  Happy  beyond  the  power 
of  evil  destiny  shall  he  be  whose  life  flows  on  in  one  calm,  full  current  of 
active  goodness — of  unceasing  benevolence  to  Man,  of  unbounded  reliance 
on  God.  Looking  back  in  the  evening  of  his  days  through  the  dissolving 
mists  of  the  past,  he  shall  discern  in  every  trial,  Discipline ;  in  every  sor- 
row, the  salutary  chastening  of  a  Divine  beneficence.  And  when  the 
bowed  frame  and  feeble  limbs  shall  admonish  him  of  failing  power  to 
execute  the  dictates  of  a  still  loving  heart,  he  shall  need  no  farther  witness 
of  the  benignity  of  that  dispensation  which  sin  recoils  from  as  Death,  but, 
pillowed  on  that  blessed  Book,  whose  promises  have  lighted  the  dim  path- 
way to  millions,  shall  sleep  to  be  awakened  in  Heave^nT 

The  ideal  of  human  life  here  pictured,  who  ever  reached 
among  men  if  Horace  Greeley  did  not? 

As  a  lecturer,  public  speaker,  Mr.  Greeley  constantly  im- 
proved with  years.  He  had  no  time,  let  us  hope  no  inclination, 
to  practice  the  art  of  delivery,  mouthing  his  piece  before  a 
looking-glass.  But  frequent  exercise  of  his  voice  in  lectures 
and  addresses  which  he  delivered  subsequently  to  his  initiation 
on  the  platform  of  "  Human  Life,"  gave  it  volume,  while  the 
same  efforts  tended  to  destroy  his  awkwardness  of  manner. 


264  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GKEELEY. 

But  he  never  acquired  any  of  the  "  tricks  of  oratory."  Though 
some  of  his  speeches,  as  we  shall  see  before  concluding  this 
volume,  were  among  the  most  admirable  exhibitions  of  argu- 
ment, statesmanship,  eloquence,  they  were  delivered  as  one  talks 
who  simply  speaks  right  on,  trusting  to  the  truth  of  his  state 
ments  and  the  value  of  his  ideas,  without  calling  to  his  aid  the 
art  of  elocution.  Had  Mr.  Greeley  studied  the  art  of  deliv- 
ery,—  for  which  he  did  not  have  time,  —  it  seems  certain  that 
he  might  have  become  as  distinguished  as  an  orator  as  he  did  as 
a  journalist.  As  it  was,  his  style,  though  ever  perfectly  natu- 
ral, and,  therefore,  interesting,  was  not  impressive  and  added 
nothing  to  the  truths  he  advocated. 

Early  in  1850,  the  Messrs.  Harpers  Brothers  published  a 
volume  by  Horace  Greeley  which  was  entitled  "  Hints  Towards 
Reforms."  It  consisted  of  the  lectures,  and  written  addresses, 
he  had  up  to  that  time  delivered,  and  a  number  of  essays  on 
topics  of  reform  which  had  appeared  in  The  Tribune  and  other 
publications.  The  subjects  treated  in  this  volume  were  vari- 
ously named:  "The  Emancipation  of  Labour;"  "Life — the 
Ideal  and  the  Actual;"  "The  Formation  of  Character;"  "The 
Relations  of  Learning  to  Labour;"  "Human  Life;"  "The 
Organization  of  Labour;"  "Teachers  and  Teaching;"  "La- 
bour's Political  Economy;"  "Alcoholic  Liquors — their  Nature 
and  Effect:"  "The  Social  Architects  — Fourier;"  "The  Union 
of  Workers;"  "  Strikes  and  their  Remedy,"  etc.,  etc.  Never- 
theless, the  leading  object  throughout  appears  the  presentation 
of  a  plea  in  behalf  of  working-men.  To  elevate  Labour;  to 
banish  poverty  fsom  the  earth,  —  such  is  the  plain  design  of 
Mr.  Greeley's  "  Hints  Towards  Reforms."  If  there  be  in  some 
of  the  lectures  an  ornate  style  which  his  severe  taste  of  later 
years  would  have  condemned,  they  nevertheless  show  a  rich- 
ness of  thought  a  generous  philanthropy  characteristic  of  his 
mind  and  heart;  and  they  may,  therefore,  be  yet  read  with 
interest  and  profit. 

In  the  preface  to  this  volume,  Mr.  Greeley  says: 

* 

But  this  work  has  a  loftier  and  worthier  aim  than  that  of  fine  writing. 
It  aspires  to  be  a  mediator,  an  interpreter,  a  reconciler,  between  Conserva- 
tism and  Radicalism  —  to  bring  the  two  into  such  connection  and  relation 


"HINTS  TOWARDS  EEFOKMS."  265 

that  the  good  in  each  may  obey  the  law  of  chemical  affinity,  and  abandon 
whatever  portion  of  either  is  false,  mistaken,  or  outworn,  to  sink  down  and 
perish.  It  endeavours  so  to  elucidate  and  commend  what  is  just  and  prac- 
tical in  the  pervading  demands  of  our  time  for  a  social  Renovation  that 
the  humane  and  philanthropic  can  no  longer  misrepresent  and  malign, 
them  as  destructive,  demoralizing,  or  infidel  in  their  tendencies,  but  must 
joyfully  recognize  in  them  the  fruits  of  past  and  the  seeds  of  future  Pro- 
gress in  the  history  of  our  race.  Defective  and  faulty  as  these  "  Hints  " 
may  be  found  or  judged,  I  feel  confident  that  their  tendency  is  to  prac- 
tical beneficence,  and  that  their  influence,  however  circumscribed,  can  not 
be  otherwise  than  wholesome.  In  the  absence  of  any  reasonable  ground 
of  hope  for  personal  gain  or  popularity,  this  trust  must  justify  my  intru- 
sion upon  the  public,  for  the  first  and  perhaps  the  last  time,  as  the  author 
of  a  book. 

The  great  truths  that  every  human  being  is  morally  bound,  by  a  law  of 
our  social  condition,  to  leave  the  world  somewhat  better  for  his  having 
lived  in  it  —  that  no  one  able  to  earn  bread  has  any  moral  right  to  eat  with- 
out earning  it  —  that  the  obligation  to  be  industrious  and  useful  is  not 
invalidated  by  the  possession  of  wealth  nor  by  the  generosity  of  wealthy  rela- 
tives— that  useful  doing  in  any  capacity  or  vocation  is  honourable  and  noble, 
while  idleness  and  prodigality  in  whatever  station  of  life  are  base  and 
contemptible  —  that  every  one  willing  to  work  has  a  clear  social  and  moral 
right  to  opportunity  to  labour  and  to  secure  the  fair  recompense  of  such 
labour,  which  society  can  not  deny  him  without  injustice  —  and  that  these 
truths  demand  and  predict  a  comprehensive  Social  Reform  based  upon  and 
molded  by  their  dictates  —  these  will  be  found  faithfully  if  not  forcibly 
Bet  forth  and  elucidated  in  the  following  pages.1 

It  was  not  very  long  after  the  publication  of  "  Hints  Towards 
Reforms  "  that,  as  I  stepped  into  the  post-office  at  Crawfords- 
ville,  Indiana,  one  day  —  I  was  then  a  student  in  Wabash 
College  —  Major  Calfee,  the  postmaster,  said:  "Look  here, 
Ingersoll,  I  wish  you'd  decypher  the  hyroglyphics  on  a  letter 
for  me."  And  he  handed  me  a  letter  over  which  he  had  been 
worrying  for  a  week.  "  Why,"  said  I,  "  that  is  a  letter  from 
Horace  Greeley,  and  it  very  plainly  says:  T.  M.  Green,  Esq., 
Corresponding  Secretary  Calliopean  Society,  Wabash  College, 
Crawfordsville,  Indiana,'  and,  as  Mr.  Green  is  out  of  town,  and 

1A  number  of  extracts  from  the  lectures  and  essays  in  this  volume  will 
be  found  in  the  Appendix.  They  may  be  profitably  studied  by  all  who 
would  clearly  understand  Mr.  Greeley's  principles  upon  a  subject  of  the 
greatest  moment  to  all  men ;  and  almost  every  one  will  find  them  inter- 
esting and  instructive  reading. 


266  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GKEELET. 

I  have  succeeded  him  in  that  office,  I  will  take  the  epistle."    It 
was  a  brief,  characteristic  letter: 

"SiR. — Your  letter  inviting  me  to  address  the  Calliopean  Society  of 
Wabash  College  in  July  next  is  received.  I  shall  have  to  decline  the  invi- 
tation. I  think  I  have  made  about  as  many  public  addresses  as  my 
reputation  can  well  afford.  If  your  society  should  wish  to  know  my  views 
on  subjects  now  receiving  public  attention,  it  will  find  them  in  a  volume 
entitled  '  Hints  Towards  Reforms,'  published  by  Harpers  &  Brothers. 
Price,  f  1.  Yours,  &c., 

"Mr.  F.  M.  Green,  "HORACE  GREELEY." 

"  Cor.  Sec.,  etc." 

The  town  of  Sandwich,  Illinois,  is  a  place  of  great  progres- 
sive spirit  as  well  as  the  home  of  many  intelligent  people.  It 
has  a  lecture  association,  of  course.  Mr.  M.  B.  Castle,  banker 
and  luml>er-merchant  as  his  letter-heads  plainly  indicated,  and 
also  the  proper  officer  of  the  association,  wrote  to  Mr.  Greeley 
inviting  him  to  lecture  at  Sandwich.  His  letter,  as  published 
by  the  newspapers,  should  have  read  as  follows: 

"  DEAR  SIR. — I  am  overworked  and  growing  old.  I  shall  be  60  next 
Feb.  3.  On  the  whole,  it  seems  I  must  decline  to  lecture  henceforth,  ex. 
cept  in  this  immediate  vicinity,  if  I  do  at  all.  I  cannot  promise  to  visit 
Illinois  on  that  errand  — certainly  not  now. 

"  Yours,  HORACE  GREELEY. 

"  M.  B.  Castle,  Esq.,  Sandwich,  111. " 

Mr.  Castle,  with  the  aid  of  Sandwich  experts,  decyphered 
Mr.  Greeley 's  letter  on  the  wrong  rule,  and  replied  as  follows: 

"  SANDWICH,  111.,  May  12. 

"  HORACE  GREELEY:  Dear  Sir. — Your  acceptance  to  lecture  before  our 
association  next  winter  came  to  hand  this  morning.  Your  penmanship 
not  being  the  plainest,  it  took  some  time  to  translate  it ;  but  we  succeeded ; 
and  would  say  your  time  '  3d  of  February,'  and  terms  '  $00,'  are  entirely 
satisfactory.  As  you  suggest,  we  may  be  able  to  get  you  other  engage- 
ments in  this  immediate  vicinity;  if  so,  we  will  advise  you. 

"  Yours  respectfully,  M.  B.  CASTLE." 

Mr.  Greeley's  rejoinder  to  this  letter  was  discovered  to  be 
emphatic,  but  it  still  awaits  a  literal  "  translation." 

Still  another  letter  on  the  lecturing  business,  and  we  have 
done.  He  was  engaged  to  lecture  at  Indianapolis,  Indiana,  in 


AT  LA  FAYETTE,   INDIANA.  267 

Felruaiy,  1857,  but,  not  arriving,  it  was  supposed  he  had 
missed  railway  connections.  A  friend  wrote  to  him  upon  the 
subject,  and  he  replied: 

"  NEW- YORK,  March  4, 1857. 

"DEAR  SIR. — I  only 'failed  to  connect 'at  Indianapolis  because  I  did 
not  try  to.  I  telegraphed  on  the  16th  from  Chicago  to  Mr.  S.  V.  Morris, 
who  had  engaged  me  at  Indianapolis,  offering  to  lecture  for  him  on  the 
19th,  and  requesting  an  answer.  He  did  not  send  any ;  so  I  did  not  go 
near  him,  but  came  home. 

"  My  engagements  and  business  will  prevent  my  return  to  the  West  this 
season  at  least. 

"Yours,  HORACE  GREELEY. 

"J.  L.  Fisk,  Esq." 

In  addition  to  a  great  many  lectures,  Mr.  Greeley  also 
delivered,  after  about  the  year  1848,  very  many  addresses 
before  agricultural  societies  in  various  parts  of  the  country. 
There  was  scarcely  a  State  in  the  Union  which  had  a  more  suc- 
cessful Agricultural  Society  than  Indiana,  from  about  the  year 
1851  onward.  The  Hon.  Joseph  A.  Wright,  Governor  of  the 
State,  afterwards  United  States  Senator  and  then  Minister  to 
Prussia,  was  scarcely  less  ardently  devoted  to  agriculture  than 
was  Mr.  Greeley  himself.  Differing  with  him  in  general 
politics,  he  was  also  like  Mr.  Greeley  in  that  he  was  an  enthu- 
siastic friend  of  the  cause  of  Total  Abstinence  from  intoxicat- 
ing drinks.  Long  President  of  the  Agricultural  Society  of 
Indiana,  Governor  Wright  invited  Mr.  Greeley  to  deliver  the 
annual  address  in  the  year  1853.  Mr.  Greeley  accepted  the 
invitation. 

The  Fair  was  held  near  the  city  of  LaFayette  in  the  month 
of  October.  The  fame  of  Mr.  Greeley  brought  thither  an 
immense  gathering  of  people.  All  portions  of  the  State  were, 
of  course,  represented  at  the  Fair,  but  on  the  day  of  the 
Address  by  Mr.  Greeley  all  the  railways  leading  to  the  city 
were  tested  to  the  utmost  of  their  capacity  in  carrying  passen- 
gers. Institutions  of  learning  within  a  radius  of  a  hundred 
miles  gave  their  students  free  leave  to  go  hear  the  Editor  of 
The  New- York  Tribune  discourse  upon  the  subject  of  farming. 
There  were  at  least  50,000  persons  present,  all  of  whom  tried 
to  hear  Mr.  Greeley's  address.  Perhaps  as  many  as  25,000 


268  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

heard  every  word  of  it.  The  writer  of  this  volume,  though 
he  had  then  recently  begun  to  feel  the  annoyance  of  the  afflic- 
tion of  deafness,  stood  far  enough  from  Mr.  Greeley  to  be  at 
the  circumference  of  an  audience  of  some  ten  or  twelve  thou- 
sand persons.  He  distinctly  heard  every  word  of  the  address 
except  the  first  few  sentences.  The  memorable  concluding 
passages  he  heard  as  well  as  though  he  had  stood  upon  the 
platform.  They  were: 

"  As  for  me,  long  tossed  on  the  stormy  waves  of  doubtful  conflict  and 
arduous  endeavour,  I  have  begun  to  feel,  since  the  shades  of  forty  years 
fell  upon  me,  the  weary,  tempest-driven  voyager's  longing  for  land,  the 
wanderer's  yearning  for  the  hamlet  where  in  childhood  he  nestled  by  his 
mother's  knee,  and  was  soothed  to  sleep  on  her  breast.  The  sober  down- 
hill of  life  dispels  many  illusions,  while  it  develops  or  strengthens  within 
us  the  attachment,  perhaps  long  smothered  or  overlaid,  for  '  that  dear  hut, 
our  home.'  And  so  I,  in  the  sober  afternoon  of  life,  when  its  sun,  if  not 
high,  is  still  warm,  have  bought  a  few  acres  of  land  in  the  broad,  still 
country,  and,  bearing  thither  my  household  treasures,  have  resolved  to 
steal  from  the  city's  labours  and  anxieties  at  least  one  day  in  each  week, 
wherein  to  revive  as  a  farmer  the  memories  of  my  childhood's  humble 
home.  And  already  I  realize  that  the  experiment  cannot  cost  so  much  aa 
it  is  worth.  Already  I  find  in  that  day's  quiet  an  antidote  and  a  solace 
for  the  feverish,  festering  cares  of  the  weeks  which  environ  it.  Already 
my  brook  murmures  a  soothing  even-song  to  my  burning,  throbbing  brain ; 
and  my  trees,  gently  stirred  by  the  fresh  breezes,  whisper  to  my  spirit 
something  of  their  own  quiet  strength  and  patient  trust  in  God.  And 
thus  do  I  faintly  realize,  though  but  for  a  brief  and  flitting  day,  the  serene 
joy  which  shall  irradiate  the  Farmer's  vocation,  when  a  fuller  and  truer 
Education  shall  have  refined  and  chastened  his  animal  cravings,  and 
when  Science  shall  have  endowed  him  with  her  treasures,  redeeming  La- 
bour from  drudgery  while  quadrupling  its  efficiency,  and  crowning  with 
beauty  and  plenty  our  bounteous,  beneficent  Earth." 

Mr.  Greeley  delivered  many  excellent  agricultural  addresses, 
but  I  doubt  whether  he  ever  more  profoundly  impressed  an 
audience  than  he  did  at  LaFayette.  It  was  not  a  month  till 
portions  of  the  address  were  made  exercises  in  declamation  in 
half  the  colleges  of  the  State.  I  even  heard  S.  V.  Morris, — 
referred  to  in  the  letter  of  Mr.  Greeley  last  above  quoted, — 
undertake  to  imitate  Mr.  Greeley's  voice  and  manner,  in  de- 
claiming the  passage  just  given,  and  with  notable  success. 

On  the  evening  of  the  same  day,  Mr.  Greeley  made  a  Tern- 


REVISITS   EUROPE.  269 

perance  speecli  to  a  large  audience.  He  was  announced  to 
speak  at  half-past  7  o'clock.  The  hall  was  packed  long  before 
this  time,  and  sundry  local  celebrities  held  forth.  At  the 
appointed  moment,  Mr.  Greeley  entered.  His  speech  was 
strong  in  argument,  and  rich  in  humour  and  anecdote,  every 
anecdote  being  also  an  argument. 

He  was  to  proceed,  making,  meantime,  a  visit  to  Indian- 
apolis, on  the  night  train  northward,  having  an  engagement  to 
lecture  at  LaPorte.  For  some  reason,  the  train  did  not  stop  at 
one  of  the  depots,  and  when  Mr.  Greeley  reached  the  other,  he 
found  himself  without  the  means  of  getting  on.  He  expressed 
his  feelings  with  astonishing  energy.  After  some  miles  travel 
on  a  freight  train,  a  hand-car  and  a  number  of  Irishmen  to 
work  it  were  given  him,  and  he  was  thus  enabled,  by  a  cold 
night  ride,  to  meet  his  appointments  in  northern  Indiana. 

Eeturning  to  New- York,  Mr.  Greeley  had  plenty  to  do 
during  the  following  year,  as  we  shall  presently  see,  in  fight- 
ing the  Kansas-Nebraska  bill  and  Know-Nothingism.  But 
before  we  recur  again  to  an  account  of  his  political  life,  let  us 
consider  a  little  further  of  his  individual  adventures,  which 
about  this  time  were  decidedly  singular  and  interesting. 

In  the  Autumn  of  1854,  his  wife,  with  their  two  surviving 
children,  took  passage  for  Europe,  he  promising  to  join  them 
early  in  the  following  year.  As  the  children  were  less  than 
six  and  four  years  old  respectively,  Mr.  Greeley  doubted  the 
wife's  courage  to  start  on  a  journey  without  him  to  a  continent 
where  she  had  scarcely  an  acquaintance;  but  he  at  length  said 
to  her,  "  If  you  are  really  going,  I  must  engage  your  passage;" 
she  replied,  "  Engage  it  then,"  and  he  forthwith  did  so.  Mrs. 
Greeley  proceeded  to  London,  where  she  spent  the  winter,  and 
where  Mr.  Greeley  joined  her  in  April,  1855.  In  a  few  days 
he  ran  over  in  advance  to  Paris,  and  there  hired  a  little  cottage 
just  outside  of  the  then  western  barrier  1'Etoile  or  octroi  gate, 
which  separates  the  Avenue  Champs  Elys6es  from  the  street 
outside,  that  leads  to  the  Bois  de  Boulogne.  Here  Mrs.  Gree- 
ley soon  rejoined  them  with  the  children,  two  female  friends, 
and  the  husband  of  one  of  them;  and  here  was  the  little  home 
of  all  for  some  two  months, — a  period  of  sight-seeing. 


270  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELET. 

On  this  voyage  to  Europe  Mr.  Greeley  sailed  in  the  Canard 
steamship  Asia.  The  weather  was  more  pleasant  than  when 
he  had  before  crossed  the  ocean,  and  he  suffered  less  from  sea- 
sickness. Nevertheless,  the  voyage  was  a  tedious  bore  to  him. 
In  a  letter  to  The  Tribune,  written  soon  after  his  arrival  in 
Paris,  he  describes  the  voyage  out.  I  quote  a  passage  which 
is  both  biographical  and  characteristic: 

I  got  one  extra  glimpse  of  sea-life  by  reason  of  the  lack  of  a  barber  ru 
the  Asia  in  common  with  all  the  Cunarders  Unschooled  in  the  art  ton- 
sorial,  I  had  gone  unshaved  more  than  a  week,  and  met  the  remonstrances 
of  friends  with  a  simple  averment  that  what  they  urged  was  impossible. 
In  this  I  was  at  length  overheard  by  a  seaman  on  deck,  who  interpleaded 
that  if  1  would  follow  him  I  should  be  speedily  and  satisfactorily  rendered 
beardless.  I  could  hardly  back  out;  so  I  followed  him  into  the  ship's 
forecastle,  took  my  seat  on  a  rough  bench  without  a  back,  whereupon  a 
rougher  tar,  with  an  instrument  which  he  seems  to  have  mistaken  for  a 
razor,  performed  the  operation  required,  and  pocketed  a  quarter  therefor 
without  grumbling.  I  did  not  offer  him  more,  for  my  face  was  smarting 
at  the  time ;  but  the  sights  and  smells  of  that  forecastle  were  richly  worth 
a  dollar.  When  we  consider  that  there,  in  a  space  not  cubically  larger 
than  two  average  prison-cells,  some  thirty  or  forty  men  live  and  sleep, 
without  a  crevice  for  ventilation,  and  in  a  reek  of  foul  effluvia  so  dense  as 
to  defy  description,  how  can  we  wonder  that  sailors  often  act  like  beasts 
on  shore  if  they  are'  forced  to  live  so  like  beasts  on  water  ?  Ah,  Messrs. 
Merchant  Princes  of  New- York!  before  you  waste  one  more  dollar  on 
attempts  to  improve  the  moral  and  religious  condition  of  seamen,  be 
entreated  to  secure  them  a  chance  to  breathe  pure  air  on  board  your  own 
vessels, — to  sleep  at  least  as  heathfully  and  decently  as  your  hogs !  Until 
you  do  this,  preaching  to  them,  scattering  tracts  and  Bibles  among  them, 
and  even  building  sailors'  homes  for  them  on  land, — though  all  excellent 
in  their  time  and  place, — will  be  just  so  much  cash  and  effort  thrown 
away 

In  another  letter  Mr.  Greeley  stated  that  he  met  no  one  who 
believed  the  empire  would  survive  Napoleon  III.  No  one 
spoke  of  the  Emperor's  patriotism  or  disinterestedness,  even 
by  way  of  joke,  but  the  journalist  observed  that  there  was  a 
general  trust  in  his  ability  and  confidence  in  his  energy.  "  He 
is  probably,"  said  Mr.  Greeley,  "the  most  active,  untiring 
ruler  now  living,  and  in  this  respect  at  least  reminds  the  French 
of  '  Napoleon  le  Grand.'  He  has,  besides,  the  undoub*  * 1 
courage,  inscrutable  pur-pose,  and  unwavering  faith  in  his 


THE  PARIS  EXPOSITION.  271 

*  star,'  which  befit  the  heir  of  the  first  Bonaparte."  Accord- 
Ing  to  Mr.  Greeley's  conviction,  the  Empire  was  France  in  a 
state  of  transition  from  monarchical  to  republican  government. 
He  observed  that  the  intelligent  workmen,  the  skilful  artificers, 
the  thinkers,  the  teachers,  the  observing,  aspiring  youth,  were 
almost  to  a  man  republicans. 

Mr.  Greeley  was  not  nearly  so  favourably  impressed  with 
the  Paris  Exposition  as  he  had  been  with  the  World's  Fair  at 
London  four  years  previously.  In  his  Recollections  of  a  Busy 
Life,  he  says:  "  I  spent  much  time  in  the  Exposition,  trying 
to  comprehend  it;  but  I  was  not  a  juror,  as  I  had  been  in 
London  four  years  previously,  and  I  did  not  feel  required  to 
study  this  Exposition  so  persistently,  so  systematically,  as  I 
had  studied  the  former.  Besides,  it  did  not  impress  me~so 
favourably  nor  interest  me  so  deeply  as  that  did.  The  edifice 
was  of  stone;  hence,  far  more  massive,  gloomy,  crypt-like,  than 
the  Hyde  Park  marvel;  and  the  French  seemed  to  me  inferior 
in  the  skill  required  for  lucid  arrangement  and  classification. 
This  judgment  may  have  been  the  dictate  of  prejudice  or  igno- 
rance; I  only  speak  a's  I  felt,  and  record  an  abiding  impression. 
Two  hours  of  impulsive  wandering  and  gazing  in  the  Paris 
Exposition  fatigued  me  more  than  four  hours'  steady  work  as 
a  juror  in  its  London  precursor;  and  I  learned  immeasura- 
bly more  from  that  of  '51  than  I  did  from  that  of  '55.  In 
fact,  the  only  point  on  which  my  little  all  of  knowledge  seems 
to  have  been  permanently  enlarged  by  the  latter  is  that  I  think 
I  obtained  here  some  faint,  rude  conception  of  the  peculiarities 
and  merits  of  the  school  of  art  termed  'pre-Raphaelite,' — I 
cannot  say  how  aptly.  I  was  deeply,  though  not  altogether 
favourably,  impressed  by  the  works  of  J.  E.  Millais,  Holman 
Hunt,  and  other  apostles  of  this  school,  whose  works  here  first 
arrested  my  attention;  and  I  now  recall  a  picture  of  'The 
Dead  Ophelia'  (by  Millais,  if  I  rightly  remember),  which 
evinced  a  pains-taking  fidelity,  and  made  a  vivid,  though  un- 
pleasant, impression.  I  trust  that  this  school  has  not  yet 
attained  its  fulness  of  development,  or  at  least  had  not  in 
1855;  if  it  had,  the  grand  achievements  of  Raphael,  of  Titian, 
and  of  Murillo  are  in  little  danger  of  being  eclipsed  or  super- 


272  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELET. 

seded  by  those  of  its  disciples  or  devotees.  Still,  the  fact 
remains,  that,  of  the  many  pictures  exhibited  in  the  Fine  Arts 
division  of  the  Paris  Exposition,  I  remember  none  beside  so 
distinctly,  so  vividly,  as  those  of  the  British  pre-Eaphaelites, 
so  called,  though  several  of  the  French  painters  of  our  day 
evince  decided  merit." 

In  a  letter  to  The  Tribune  he  thus  takes  leave  of  the  Expo- 
sition: 

I  bid  adieu  to  the  World's  Exhibition  of  1855  in  the  conviction  that  I 
have  not  half  seen  it,  and  that  nine-tenths  of  its  visitors  are  even  more 
ignorant  of  its  contents  than  I  am.  Its  immensity  tends  to  confuse  ana 
bewilder;  the  eye  glances  rapidly  from  one  brilliant  object  to  another, 
while  the  mind  fixes  steadily  upon  none ;  so  that  he  who  wanders,  fitfully 
gazing  from  court  to  court,  from  gallery  to  gallery,  may  carry  away  noth- 
ing positive  but  a  headache.  You  will  see  hundreds  jostling  and  crowding 
for  a  peep  at  the  Imperial  diamonds,  crowns,  &c.,  which  are  said  to  have 
cost  several  millions  of  dollars  (by  whom  earned?  how  taken  from  them?), 
where  a  dozen  can  with  difficulty  be  collected  to  witness  the  operation  of 
a  new  machine  calculated  to  confer  signal  benefits  on  the  whole  civilized 
world.  Who  looks  at  the  self-adjusting  windmill,  which  was  first  exhibited 
in  our  country  last  year?  Yet  that,  if  it  prove  what  it  promises,  will  do 
mankind  more  service  than  all  the  diamonds  ever  diverted  from  their 
legitimate  oflBce  of  glass-cutting  to  lend  a  false,  deceitful  glitter  to  the 
brows  of  Tyranny  and  Crime.  Here  is  a  poor  French  artisan  with  a  very 
simple  contrivance  for  taking  the  long,  coarse  hairs  from  rabbit-skins, 
leaving  the  fine,  soft  fur  to  be  removed  by  itself,  —  the  machine  possibly 
coating  twenty  francs,  and  the  dressing  therewith  of  each  skin  hardly  a 
cent,  while  the  value  of  the  fur  is  thereby  doubled.  This  is  a  very  small 
matter,  which  hardly  any  one  regards;  yet  it  is  probably  worth  to  Europe 
more  than  the  annual  cost  of  either  of  its  royal  families,  or  twenty  times 
the  value  of  them  all. 

Mr.  Greeley  writes  characteristically  of  his  visit  to  The 
Invalides,  —  "a  great  establishment,"  he  says,  "erected  in  the 
southwest  quarter  of  Paris  by  Louis  XIV.,  as  a  hospital  or 
home  for  maimed,  disabled,  or  worn-out  soldiers  —  surviving 
victims  of  the  bloody  phantom,  Glory.  *  *  Opposite  the 
entrance  of  this  church  (that  for  the  Invalides)  rises  the  grand 
altar,  resplendent  in  gold,  and  lighted  by  side-windows  with 
such  art  that,  even  in  a  dark,  raining  day,  the  whole  seems  to 
bask  and  blaze  in  the  richest  sunlight;  and  behind  thig,  in 
what  would  seem  to  be  an  extension  of  the  church,  is  the  tomb 


TOMB   OF   NAPOLEON   I.  273 

of  Napoleon  I.  Though  you  are  within  a  few  feet  of  this 
structure  when  near  the  grand  altar  in  the  church,  you  are 
compelled  to  go  half  a  mile  around  to  enter  it,  and  I  am 
not  quite  sure  that  the  journey  is  repaid  to  those  whose 
admiration  of  military  or  other  despots  is  not  stronger  than 
mine.  Here  marble  and  porphyry,  painting  and  sculpture, 
gilding  and  mosaic,  have  been  lavished  without  stint,  and  some 
two  millions  of  dollars  wrested  from  the  scanty  earnings  of  an 
overtaxed  peasantry  to  honour  the  bones  of  him  who  while 
living  was  so  prodigal  alike  of  their  treasure  and  their  blood. 
The  author  of  this  squandering  idolatry  was  Louis  Philippe, 
who  thought  he  was  ingratiating  himself  with  the  French 
people  by  pandering  to  the  worship  of  the  military  Jugger- 
naut, and  whose  family  now  live,  as  he  himself  died,  in  exile 
and  humiliation,  while  the  vast  estates  he  left  them  have  been 
seized  and  confiscated  by  the  nephew  and  heir  of  the  Corsican 
he  thus  helped  to  defy.  "Who  can  pity  the  schemer  thus  caught 
in  his  own  snare?  Who  can  marvel  that  France,  not  yet  fully 
cured  of  that  passion  for  glory  which  exults  over  a  victory 
because  our  side  has  won,  and  not  because  the  universal  sway 
of  justice  and  equity  has  been  brought  nearer  thereby,  should 
find  herself  ground  under  the  heel  of  a  fresh  despot,  who  tears 
their  youth  from  their  beloved  homes  and  useful  labours  to 
swell  the  unripe  harvest  of  death  on  the  battle-field?  I  forget 
the  name  of  the  French  Democrat  who  observed  that  hia 
country  could  never  enjoy  true  liberty  until  the  ashes  of 
Napoleon  shall  be  torn  from  this  costly  mausoleum  and  thrown 
into  the  Seine,  but  I  fully  concur  in  his  opinion." 

A  very  remarkable  adventure  had  Mr.  Greeley  during  this 
visit  to  Paris,  being  nothing  less  than  his  incarceration  for  two 
days  in  a  French  prison.  He  told  the  story  with  great  fulness 
in  his  letters  to  The  Tribune,  but  his  lengthy  account  of  it  in 
his  Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life  is,  perhaps,  eyen  better: 

In  the  years  1853-53,  an  association  of  mainly  wealthy  and  public-spirited 
New-Yorkers  undertook  to  imitate,  if  not  rival,  the  first  great  Exposition 
of  the  World's  Industry  at  London  in  1851.  So  they  subscribed  capital, ' 
obtained  a  charter  from  the  State,  and  a  plot  of  vacant  ground  from  tho 
city,  employed  architects  and  builders,  and  at  length  constructed  oik 
'  18 


274  UFE   OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

Reservoir  Square  (Sixth  Avenue  and  Fortieth  to  Forty-second  streets),  by 
far  the  most  symmetrical  and  spacious  edifice  which  our  country  has  yet 
seen.  The  materials  employed  were  almost  wholly  iron  and  glass,  as  in 
the  case  of  the  London  prototype ;  but  though  the  British  was  a  superb 
structure,  ours  was  still  more  graceful  and  imposing.  I  doubt  that  many 
are  yet  born  who  will  see  New- York  graced  by  a  finer  building  than  was 
her  Crystal  Palace,  until  destroyed  by  fire  in  1858.  • 

Yet  the  Exhibition  was  doomed  to  failure  from  the  start.  It  was  located 
much  too  far  up  town, — as  much  out  of  the  way  as  it  would  to-day  be  at 
Harlem  or  Hoboken, — it  was  but  half  finished,  and  nowise  ready,  when 
opened, — and  it  steadily  dragged,  after  the  first  few  days,  until,  at  the  close 
of  the  season,  it  was  found  that  the  million  or  more  of  capital  stock  was 
all  sunk,  and  the  half-million  bonds  a  very  dubious  investment. 

A  desperate  effort  was  made  to  retrieve  its  fallen  fortunes  next  Spring ; 
and  I,  with  others,  was  then  induced  to  take  a  hand  in  it  as  a  director  and 
(in  a  small  way)  bondholder.  Mr.  P.  T.  Barnum  was  our  most  active,  effi- 
cient leader  in  this  desperate  effort  at  resurrection.  There  were  several 
more  directors  who  did  their  very  best ;  but  the  year  (1854)  was  one  of 
pecuniary  pressure  and  revulsion,  which  combined  with  other  influences 
to  render  success  impossible.  I  gave  much  hard  work  and  a  little  money 
to  the  attempt,  while  Mr.  Barnum  gave  much  more,  but  to  no  purpose;  we 
barely  paid  our  heavy  current  expenses ;  and  the  Exposition  closed  with 
the  season,  nearly  as  bankrupt  as  when  we  undertook  to  resuscitate  it. 

I  went  to  Europe  the  next  Spring  (1855)  without  a  suspicion  that  *1 
should  there  be  held  accountable  for  our  inability  to  wrest  victory  from 
defeat;  yet,  about  4  p.  M.  of  the  2d  day  of  June,  after  I  had  returned  from 
a  day's  observation  in  the  French  "  Palace  of  Industry,"  I  was  waited  on 
at  my  little  cottage  by  four  French  strangers,  who  soon  gave  me  to  under- 
stand that  they  were  officers  of  the  law,  bearing  a  writ  issued  by  Judge  de 
Belleyrne,  of  the  Court  of  Premier  Instance,  at  the  suit  of  one  M. 
Lechesne,  a  Parisian  sculptor,  who  swore  that  he  had  contributed  to  our 
New- York  Exhibition  a  statue  (in  plaster)  which  had  there  been  broken, 
or  mutilated ;  for  which  he  claimed  of  me,  as  a  director,  "  represontant  et 
solidaire,"  of  the  Exhibition,  "douze  mille  francs,"  or  $2,500  in  gold. 
When  we  had,  by  the  help  of  my  courier,  arrived  at  some  approach  to  a 
mutual  understanding,  one  element  of  which  was  my  refusal  to  pay  to  M. 
Lechesne  $2,500,  or  any  sum  whatever,  they  said  that  I  must  enter  their 
carriage  and  accompany  them  forthwith  to  the  Judge,  some  three  miles 
away ;  which,  attended  by  my  courier,  I  did.  We  had  to  call  for  Lechesne 
and  his  lawyer  by  the  way,  which  consumed  nearly  an  hour, — they  being 
in  no  hurry;  and,  when  we  had  told  the  Judge  our  respective  stories,  I 
proposed  to  go  to  the  American  Legation  and  persuade  Don  Piatt,  Esq., 
Secretary  of  Legation,  to  guarantee  my  appearance  for  trial  when  wanted. 
The  Judge  pronounced  this  sufficient;  so  we  set  forth  on  another  long  ride 
to  the  Legation ;  where  not  only  Judge  Piatt,  but  another  friend,  Maunsel 
B.  Field,  Esq.,  offered  himself  as  security  for  my  appearance  at  court;  but 
now  Lechesne  and  his  lawyer  refused,  on  the  ground  of  Mr.  Piatt'^  exemp- 


IN   A   FRENCH   PRISON.  275 

lion  from  arrest  on  civil  process,  to  take  him  as  security,  or  (in  fact)  to  take 
anything  but  the  cash  they  were  intent  on.  High  words  passed,  and  a 
scuffle  was  imminent,  when  I  insisted  on  being  driven  at  once  to  prison, — 
my  guardians  having  affected  a  fear  that  I*  would  escape  them.  Crossing 
the  Avenue  Champs  Elysee,  densely  thronged  at  that  hour  (6  P.  M.),  our 
carriage  came  into  violent  collision  with  another,  and  was  disabled ;  when 
a  very  superfluous  display  of  vigilance  and  pistols  was  made  by  my  keep- 
ers, who  could  not  be  persuaded  that  I  was  intent  on  sticking  to  them  like 
a  brother.  At  last,  a  little  before  7  p.  M.,  we  reached  our  destination,  and 
I  was  admitted,  through  several  gigantic  iron  doors,  with  gloomy  crypts 
between  them,  to  the  office  of  the  prison,  where  I  was  told  that  I  must 
stay  till  9^£  p.  M.,  because  the  Judge  had  allowed  me  so  long  to  procure 
bail.  Here  my  guardians  left  me  in  safe-keeping,  while  I  ordered  a  frugal 
dinner,  instead  of  the  sumptuous  public  one  at  the  Trois  Freres,  given  by 
Mr.  M.  B.  Field,  which  I  had  been  invited,  and  had  fully  expected,  to 
attend ;  and  I  sent  my  courier  home  to  quiet  the  apprehension  of  my  fam- 
ily, who  as  yet  knew  only  that  some  strangers  had  called  for  me,  and  that 
I  had  gone  off  with  them. 

Very  soon,  Judge  Mason  (John  Y.),  our  Ambassador,  called,  and  was 
admitted  to  see  me,  though  it  was  now  too  late  by  the  regulations.  I 
explained  the  matter  to  him,  assured  him  that  I  wanted  nothing  but  a 
good  lawyer,  and  insisted  on  viewing  the  whole  matter  in  a  more  cheerful 
light  than  it  wore  in  his  eyes.  "  But  your  wife  will  surely  be  distressed  by 
it,"  he  urged ;  "  she  being  an  utter  stranger  here,  with  two  young  children." 
•No,"  I  replied;  "a  trifle  might  annoy  her;  but  this  matter  looks  serious, 
and  it  will  only  calm  and  strengthen  her.  I  have  sent  our  courier  to 
assure  her  that  it  is  all  right,  and  request  her  to  keep  away  from  this,  and 
go  on  with  her  visiting  and  sight-seeing,  as  though  nothing  had  happened." 
"  I  have  heard  you  called  a  philosopher,  and  I  now  see  that  you  deserve 
the  distinction,"  was  the  Judge's  rejoinder,  as,  at  my  request,  he  left  me. 

Half  an  hour  had  scarcely  passed,  giving  me  barely  time  to  eat  my  din- 
ner, when  my  wife  was  ushered  in,  accompanied  by  Mrs.  Piatt  and  our 
little  son,  whose  eyes  were  distended  with  grave  wonder  at  the  iron  bar- 
riers through  which  he  had  reached  me.  "  Good  woman,"  I  observed  to 
Mrs.  Greeley,  "  I  have  been  bragging  to  Judge  Mason  how  quietly  you  would 
take  this  mischance;  but  here  you  are  in  jail  at  nightfall,  when  visitors 
are  not  allowed,  as  though  you  were  addicted  to  hysterics."  "  But  con- 
sider," she  urged  in  mitigation,  "that  I  first  heard  of  your  position  from 
Francis  [our  courier],  who  comes  flying  home  to  assure  me  that  there  is 
nothing  serious,  to  urge  me  not  to  be  frightened,  when  he  is  trembling  all 
over  with  anxiety  and  terrour.  Hardly  had  he  left  the  room,  when  Mrs. 
Piatt  comes  in  equal  haste  to  beg  me  to  fear  nothing, — that  all  is  but  a 
trifle, — and  sJie  is  quite  as  agitated  and  panic-stricken  as  Francis.  Neither 
of  them  seems  to  understand  the  matter ;  so  I  thought  I  must  come  to  you 
for  an  explanation."  This  I  gave ;  when  they  departed ;  and  I  was  at  last 
allowed  to  go  up  to  my  lodging,  which  I  find  thus  described  in  my  letter 
thence  to  The  Tribune :— 


276  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

"  By  10  o'clock,  each  of  us  lodgers  had  retired  to  our  several  apartments  (each  eight 
feet  by  five),  and  an  obliging  functionary  came  around  and  locked  out  all  rascally  intru- 
ders. I  don't  think  I  ever  before  slept  in  a  place  BO  perfectly  secure.  At  6  this  morning, 
this  extra  protection  was  withdrawn,  and  each  of  us  was  thenceforth  required  to  keep 
watch  over  his  own  valuables.  We  uniformly  keep  good  hours  here  in  Clichy,  which  is  a 
virtue  that  not  many  large  hotels  in  Paris  can  boast  of. 

"  The  bedroom  appointments  are  not  of  a  high  order,  as  is  reasonable,  since  we  are  only 
charged  for  them  four  sous  (cents)  per  night, — washing  extra.  The  sheets  are  rather  of 
a  hickory  sort,  but  mine  were  given  to  me  clean;  the  bed  is  indifferent,  but  I  have  slept 
on  worse;  the  window  lacks  a  curtain  or  blind,  but  in  Its  stead  there  are  four  strong 
upright  iron  bars,  which  are  a  perfect  safeguard  against  getting  up  in  the  night,  and  fall- 
Ing  or  pitching  out,  so  as  to  break  your  neck,  as  any  one  who  fell  thence  would  certainly 
do.  (I  am  in  the  fifth  or  highest  story.)  Perhaps  one  of  my  predecessors  was  a  som- 
nambulist. I  have  two  chairs,  two  little  tables  (probably  one  of  them  extra,  through 
some  mistake),  and  a  cupboard  which  may  once  have  been  clean.  The  pint  washbowl, 
half-pint  pitcher,  <fcc.,  I  have  ordered,  and  am  to  pay  extra  for.  I  am  a  little  ashamed  to 
own  that  my  repose  has  been  indifferent;  but  then  I  never  do  sleep  well  in  a  strange 
place." 

As  it  was  Saturday  evening  when  I  was  taken  to  jail,  I  could  not  expect 
a  release  before  Monday ;  in  fact,  the  lawyers  who  were  applied  to  in  mj' 
behalf  had  all  gone  out  of  town,  and  could  not  be  found  till  that  day.  I 
rose  on  Sunday  morning  in  a  less  placid  frame  of  mind  than  I  had  cher- 
ished over  night,  and  devoted  a  good  part  of  the  day  to  concocting  an 
account  of  the  matter  meant  to  be  satirical,  and  to  "  chaff "  mankind  in 
general  by  contrasting  the  ways  of  Clichy  with  those  of  the  outside  world, 
to  the  dispraise  of  the  latter.  Here  is  a  specimen : — 

"  I  say  nothing  of  *  Liberty,'  save  to  caution  outsiders  in  France  to  be  equally  modest ; 
but '  Equality '  and  '  Fraternity  '  I  have  found  here  more  thoroughly  than  elsewhere  in 
Europe.  Still,  we  have  not  realized  the  social  millennium,  even  in  Clichy.  Some  of  us 
were  wont  to  gain  our  living  by  the  hardest  and  most  meagrely  rewarded  labour;  others 
to  live  idly  and  sumptuously  on  the  earnings  of  others.  Of  course,  these  vices  of  an  irra- 
tional and  decaying  social  state  are  not  instantly  eradicated  by  our  abrupt  transfer  to 
this  mansion.  Some  of  us  cau  cook;  while  others  only  know  how  to  eat,  and  so  require 
assistance  in  the  preparation  of  our  food,  as  none  is  cooked  or  even  provided  for  us,  and 
our  intercourse  with  the  outer  world  is  subject  to  limitations.  Those  of  us  who  lived 
generously  aforetime,  and  are  in  for  gentlemanly  sums,  are  very  apt  to  have  money,; 
while  the  luckless  chaps  who  were  sent  here  for  owing  a  beggarly  hundred  francs  or  so, 
and  have  no  fixed  income  beyond  the  single  franc  per  day  which  each  creditor  must  pay, 
or  his  debtor  is  turned  loose,  are  very  glad  to  earn  money  by  doing  us  acts  of  kindness. 
One  of  these  attached  himself  to  me  immediately  on  my  induction  into  my  apartment, 
and  proceeded  to  make  my  bed,  bring  me  a  pitcher  of  water  and  wash-bowl,  matches, 
lights,  &c.,  for  which  I  expect  to  pay  him, — these  articles  being  reckoned  superfluities 
in  Clichy.  But  no  such  aristocratic  distinction  as  master — no  such  degrading  appella- 
tion as  servant  —  is  tolerated  in  this  community:  this  philanthropic  fellow-boarder  is 
known  to  all  here  as  my  '  auxiliary.'  Where  has  the  stupid  world  outside  known  how  to 
drape  the  hard  realities  of  life  with  fig-leaf  so  graceful  as  this  ? 

"  So  of  all  titular  distinctions.  We  pretend  that  we  have  abjured  titles  of  honour  in 
America;  and  the  consequence  is  that  everyone  has  a  title,  —  either  'Honourable,'  or 
•General,'  or  'Colonel,'  or  'Reverend,'  or,  at  the  very  least,  'Esquire.'  But  here  in 
Clichy  all  such  empty  and  absurd  prefixes  or  suffixes  are  absolutely  unknown;  even 
names,  Christian  or  family,  are  discarded  as  useless,  antiquated  lumber.  Every  lodger 
is  known  by  the  number  of  his  apartment  only,  which  no  one  thinks  of  designating  a  cell. 
Mine  is  139:  so,  whenever  a  friend  calls,  he  gives  two  cents  to  a  '  commissionaire,'  who 
comes  in  from  the  outer  regions  to  the  great  hall  sacred  to  our  common  use,  and  begins 


IN   A   FRENCH   PRISON.  277 

tailing  ont  cent-trente-neuf  (phonetically  '  son-tran-nnf  ')  at  the  top  of  his  voice,  and 
goes  011,  yelling  as  he  climbs,  in  the  hope  of  finding  or  calling  me  short  of  ascending  to 
my  fifth-story  sanctuary.  To  nine-tenths  of  my  comrades  in  adversity  I  am  known  only 
as  *  son-tran-nuf.'  My  auxiliary  is  No.  54;  so  I,  when  I  need  his  aid,  go  singing  'sankon- 
cat,'  after  the  same  fashion.  Equality  being  thus  rigidly  preserved,  maugre  some  diver- 
sities of  fortune,  the  jealousies,  rivalries,  and  heart-burnings,  which  keep  the  mass  of 
mankind  in  a  ferment,  are  here  absolutely  unknown.  I  never  before  talked  with  so 
many  people  intimate  with  each  other  without  hearing  something  said  or  insinuated  to 
one  another's  prejudice;  here,  there  is  nothing  of  the  sort.  Some  folks  outside  are 
fitted  with  reputations  which  they  would  hardly  consider  flattering,  —  some  laws  and 
usages  get  the  blessing  they  so  richly  deserve,  — but  among  ourselves  is  naught  but  har- 
mony and  good-will.  How  would  the  Hotel  de  Ville,  or  even  the  Tuilcries  like  to  compare 
notes  with  us  on  this  head?  " 

A  Yankee  prisoner,  who  had  seen  toe  in  New- York,  recognized  me  as  I 
came  down  stairs  on  Sunday  morning,  and  blazoned  his  inference  that  I 
was  in  jail  by  some  mistake, — so  I  was  soon  surrounded  by  sympathizing 
fellow  jail-birds,  several  of  whom  were  no  more  justly  liable  to  imprison- 
ment than  I  was.  In  a  little  while,  M.  Vattemare,  well  known  in  his  day 
as  the  projector  of  systematic  international  exchanges  of  books  and  docu- 
ments, having  heard  of  my  luck  at  Mr.  Field's  dinner  the  evening  previous, 
made  his  way  in,  with  proffers  of  service,  which  I  turned  to  account  by 
obtaining,  through  him,  from  some  great  library,  copies  of  the  Revised 
Statutes  and  Session  Laws  of  New  York,  which  clearly  demonstrated  my 
legal  irresponsibility  to  M.  Lechesne  for  his  damaged  statue.  Soon,  other 
friends  began  to  pour  in,  with  offers  of  money  and  service ;  but  I  could 
not  afford  to  be  bailed  out  nor  bought  out,  as  fifty  others  would  thereby  be 
tempted  to  repeat  M.Lediesne's  experiment  Upon  me, — so  I  was  compelled 
to  send  them  away,  with  my  grateful  acknowledgements. 

Among  my  visitors  was  M.  Hector  Bossange,  the  well-known  publisher, 
who  had  been  accustomed  to  call  at  my  rooms  each  Sunday,  as  he  did  on 
this  one,  and  was  soon  asked  by  my  wife,  "  Have  you  seen  Mr.  Greeley  ?" 
"  Seen  him !  "  he  perplexedly  responded,  "  I  do  not  understand  you ;  have 
I  not  called  to  see  him?"  "Then  you  have  not  heard  that  he  is  in 
prison  ?  "  "  In  prison,"  he  wildly  inquired ;  "  what  can  that  mean  ?  "  "I 
do  not  well  understand  it  myself,"  she  replied;  "  but  it  has  some  connec- 
tion with  our  New-York  Crystal  Palace."  "  O,  it  is  money,  —  is  it  ? " 
joyfully  rejoined  M.  Bossange:  "then  we  will  soon  have  him  out,  —  I 
feared  it  was  politics!'1''  He  knew  that  I  was  a  furious  anti-Imperialist, 
and  feared  that  I  had  really  involved  myself  in  some  plot  that  exposed  me 
to  arrest  as  an  apostle  of  sedition,  —  an  enemy  of  "order." 

Our  remaining  visitors  having  been  barred  out  when  the  clock  struck  4 
p.  M.,  we  two  Americans,  with  two  Englishmen,  a  Frenchman,  and  an 
Italian,  sent  out  our  order,  and  had  our  dinner  in  the  cell  of  one  of  us, 
who,  being  an  old  settler,  had  an  apartment  somewhat  more  roomy  and 
less  exalted  than  mine.  Each  brought  to  the  common  "spread  "  whatever 
he  had  of  table-ware  or  pocket-cutlery;  and  the  aggregate,  though  there 
were  still  deficiencies,  answered  the  purpose.  The  dinner  cost  fifty  cents 
per  head,  of  which  a  part  went  as  toll  to  some  officer  or  turnkey,  and  there 
was  still  a  good  margin  of  profit  to  the  restaurateur.  Still,  there  wua 


278  LIFE   OF  HORACE   GREELET. 

wine  for  those  who  would  drink  it;  but  stronger  liquors  are  not  allowed 
in  Clichy,  in  spite  of  the  assurance,  so  often  heard,  that  prohibitory  legis- 
lation is  unknown  in  France.  A  flask  of  cut-throat-looking  brandy  had, 
however,  been  smuggled  in  for  one  of  our  party;  and  this  was  handed 
around  and  sipped  as  though  it  were  nectar.  Men  love  to  circumvent  the 
laws  for  the  gratification  of  their  appetites;  and  yet  I  judge  that  not  one 
gill  of  spirits  is  drank  in  Clichy,  where  quarts  were  poured  down  while 
every  one  was  free  to  order  and  drink  so  long  as  he  could  pay. 

I  presume  I  had  had  more  calls  that  day  than  any  other  prisoner, 
though  Sunday  is  specially  devoted  to  visits ;  and,  though  grateful  for  the 
kindless  and  zeal  for  my  release  evinced  by  several  of  my  friends,  I  was 
thoroughly  weary  when  the  lingerers  were  invited  to  take  their  departure, 
and  the  doors  clanged  heavily  behind  them.  I  could  then  appreciate  the 
politeness  with  which  M.  Ouvrard,  Napoleon's  great  army-contractor,  after 
he  had  fallen  into  embarrassments  and  been  lodged  in  Clichy  by  his 
inexorable  creditors,  was  accustomed,  when  visitors  called,  to  send  to  the 
grating  his  faithful  valet,  who,  with  the  politest  bow  and  shrug  whereof  he 
was  master,  would  say,  "  I  am  sorry,  sir, — very  sorry ;  but  my  master,  M. 
Ouvrard,  is  out."  This  was  not  even  the  "white  lie"  often  instigated  by 
good  society ;  since  the  visitor  could  not  fail  to  understand  that  the  great 
bankrupt  could  be  out  in  none  other  than  that  conventional,  metaphorical 
sense  which  implies  merely  preoccupation,  or  unwillingness  to  be  button- 
holed and  bored. 

No  prisoner  in  Clichy  is  obliged  to  see  a  visitor  unless  of  his  own 
choice ;  and,  as  one  is  frequently  called  down  to  the  grating  to  have  a  fresh 
writ  served  on  him,  thereby  magnifying  the  obstacles  to  his  liberation,  the 
rule  that  a  visitor  must  make  a  minute  of  his  errand  on  his  card,  and  send 
it  up,  before  an  interview  is  accorded,  is  one  founded  in  reason,  and  very 
generally  and  properly  adhered  to.  Yet  a  fellow-prisoner,  who  received 
notice  that  he  was  called  for  at  the  grate,  went  recklessly  down  on  the 
day  after  my  incarceration,  only  to  greet  a  tip-staff,  and  be  served  with  a 
fresh  writ.  "Sir,"  said  the  beguiled  and  indignant  boarder  at  this  city 
hermitage,  "  if  you  ever  serve  me  such  a  trick  again,  you  will  go  out  of 
here  half  killed."  Some  official  underling  was  violently  suspected  of 
lending  himself  to  this  stratagem ;  and  great  was  the  indignation  excited 
thereby  throughout  our  community ;  but  the  victim  had  only  himself  to 
blame,  for  not  standing  on  his  reserved  rights,  and  respecting  the  usages 
and  immunities  of  our  sanctuary. 

I  was  puzzled,  but  not  offended,  at  a  question  put  me  the  moment  I  had 
fairly  entered  the  prison :  "  Have  you  ever  been  confined  here  before  ?"  I 
respectfully,  but  positively,  replied  in  the  negative, — that  this  was  my  first 
experience  of  the  kind.  I  soon  learned,  however,  that  the  question  was  a 
prescribed  and  necessary  one, — that,  if  I  had  ever  before  been  imprisoned 
on  this  allegation  of  debt,  or  on  any  other,  and  this  had  been  lodged 
against  me,  I  was  not  liable  to  a  fresh  detention  thereon,  but  must  at  once 
be  discharged.  The  rule  is  a  good  one ;  and,  though  I  was  unable  then  to 
profit  by  it,  it  may  serve  me  another  time. 


m  A  FKEJSCH  PBISON.  279 

My  general  conclusion,  from  all  I  observed  and  beard  in  Clichy,  imports 
that  imprisonment  for  debt  was  never  a  bar  to  improvidence,  nor  a  curb 
to  prodigality;  that,  in  so  far  as  it  ever  aided  or  hastened  the  collection 
of  honest  debts,  it  wrenched  five  dollars  from  sympathizing  relatives  and 
friends  for  every  one  exacted  from  the  debtors  themselves;  and  that  it 
was,  and  could  not  fail  to  be,  fruitful  only  in  oppression  and  extortion, — 
much  oftener  enforcing  the  payment  of  unjust  claims  than  of  just  ones. 
Let  whoever  will  sneer  at  human  progress  and  uneasy,  meddling  philan- 
thropy,  I  am  grateful  that  I  have  lived  in  the  age  which  gave  the  death 
blow  to  Slavery  and  to  Imprisonment  for  Debt. 

To  get  into  prison  is  a  feat  easy  of  achievement  by  almost  any  one;  it 
is  quite  otherwise  with  getting  out.  You  cannot  fully  realize  how  rigid 
stone  walls  and  iron  doors  are  till  they  stand  between  you  and  sunshine, 
impeding  locomotion,  and  forbidding  any  but  the  most  limited  change 
of  place.  The  restless  anxiety  of  prisoners  for  release,  no  matter  how 
light  their  cares,  how  ample  their  apartments,  how  generous  their  fare, 
can  never  be  appreciated  by  one  who  has  not  had  a  massive  key  turned 
upon  him,  and  found  himself  on  the  wrong  side  of  an  impregnable  wall. 
Doubtless,  we  hear  much  nonsense  whereof  "Liberty"  is  the  burden;  but, 
if  you  are  skeptical  as  to  the  essential  worth  of  Freedom,  just  allow  your- 
self to  be  locked  up  for  a  while,  with  no  clear  prospect  of  liberation  at 
any  specified  or  definite  time.  Though  I  was  but  forty-eight  hours  in 
Clichy,  time  dragged  heavily  on  my  hands,  after  the  friends  who,  in 
generous  profusion,  visited  me  on  Sunday  had  been  barred  and  locked 
out,  and  I  was  left  for  a  second  night  to  my  fellow  jail-birds  and'  my 
gloomy  reflections.  "  I  'can't  get  out,"  was  the  melancholy  plaint  of 
Sterne's  starling;  and  I  had  occasion  to  believe  that  so  many  detainers.or 
claims  similar  to  Lechesne's  would,  on  Monday,  be  lodged  against  me,  as 
to  render  doubtful  my  release  for  weeks,  if  not  for  months. 

It  was  late  on  Monday  morning  before  my  active  friends  outside  could 
procure  me  the  help  I  needed;  but,  when  they  did,  I  had,  through  M. 
Vattemare's  valued  aid,  the  books  I  required,  and  had  my  references  and 
citations  all  ready  for  service.  With  these  in  hand,  my  lawyers  went 
before  Judge  de  Belleyme  to  procure  my  release ;  but  M.  Vattemare  had 
been  there  already,  as  well  as  to  M.  de  Langle,  the  judge  of  a  still  higher 
court,  to  testify  that  the  Americans  were  generally  indignant  at  my  incar- 
ceration,  and  were  threatening  to  leave  Paris  in  a  body  if  I  were  not 
promptly  liberated.  Even  M.  James  Rothschild,  I  was  told,  had  made  an 
indignant  speech  about  it  at  a  dinner  on  Saturday  evening;  saying  to  hia 
friends :  "  We  are  most  of  us  directors  in  the  Exposition  now  in  progress 
here,  and  of  course  liable  to  be  arrested  and  imprisoned  in  any  foreign 
country  we  may  visit,  on  a  complaint  that  some  one  has  had  articles  dam- 
aged or  lost  here,  if  Mr.  Greeley  may  be  so  held  in  this  action." 

These  representations  impelled  M.  de  Belleyme  to  say,  in  perfect  truth, 
that  he  had  not  ordered  my  imprisonment, — on  the  contrary,  he  had 
directed  the  plaintiff  and  his  lawyer  to  take  Mr.  Don  Piatt's  guaranty 
that  L  should  be  on  hand,  when  wanted,  to  respond  to  this  action.  So 


280  LIFE   OF   HORACE    3REELEY. 

when,  at  the  instance  of  my  lawyers,  M.  Lechesne  and  his  attorneys  were 
called  to  confront  them  before  the  Judge  on  Monday,  and  were  asked  by 
him  how  they  came  to  take  me  to  Clichy,  under  the  circumstances,  they 
could  only  stammer  out  that  they  had  reflected  that  Mr.  Piatt  was  not 
subject  to  imprisonment  in  like  case, — therefore  his  guaranty  was  no 
security.  This,  of  course,  did  not  satisfy  the  Judge,  who  ordered  my 
release  on  the  instant;  so  by  4  p.  M.  all  formalities  were  concluded,  and 
tny  lawyers  appeared  with  the  documents  required  to  turn  me  into  the 
street.  Meantime,  I  had  had  so  many  visitors,  who  sent  up  good-looking 
cards,  and  wore  honest  faces,  that  I  had  manifestly  risen  in  the  estimation 
of  my  jailers,  who  had  begun  to  treat  me  with  ample  consideration. 

The  neighbouring  servants,  who  were  intimate  with  ours,  had  witnessed 
my  departure  with  the  officers,  and  knew,  of  course,  that  this  was  an 
arrest,  but  pretended  to  our  servants  not  to  understand  it.  One  after 
another  of  them  would  call  on  our  employes  to  ask,  "Why,  where  is  Mr. 
Greeley?"  "He  has  gone  over  to  London  on  a  little  business,"  was  the 
prompt  reply,  "  and  will  be  back  in  a  day  or  two."  This  was  accepted 
with  many  a  sly  wink  and  gentle  shrug ;  the  inquisitors  having  obviously 
united  in  the  conclusion  that  I  was  a  swindler,  who  had  robbed  some 
bank  or  vault,  and  fled  from  my  own  country  to  enjoy  the  fruits  of  my 
depredations.  "When,  however,  I  came  quietly  home  in  a  cab  about  the 
time  indicated  by  our  servants,  they  greatly  exulted  over  the  hoped-for, 
rather  than  expected,  denouement,  while  their  good-natured  friends  were 
correspondingly  disconcerted  by  the  failure  of  their  calculations.  On  our 
part,  we  resumed  at  once  our  round  of  visiting  and  sight-seeing,  as  though 
nothing  had  happened;  but  my  little  son's  flying  hair  and  radiant  face,  as 
he>  rushed  down  stairs  to  greet  my  return,  will  not  soon  be  forgotten.  Ho 
had  been  told  that  it  was  all  right,  when  he  found  and  left  me  in  prison, 
and  had  tried  hard  to  believe  it ;  but  my  return,  unattended  and  unguarded, 
he  knew  to  be  right. 

I  had  a  tedious  legal  squabble  thereafter, — for  my  liberation  did  not,  of 
course,  abate  M.  Lechesne's  suit  against  me, — and  had  to  send  to  New-York 
for  documents  and  affidavits ;  meantime  going  to  Switzerland  with  my 
family,  as  I  have  already  related, — and  I  was  signally  aided  in  my  defense 
by  Hon.  Elihu  B.  Washburne,  of  Illinois,  who  happened  to  be  in  Paris  at 
the  time;  but,  as  there  was  really  no  case  against  me,  I  was  at  length 
enabled  to  demonstrate  that  fact  to  the  satisfaction  of  the  functionary  who 
had  been  deputed  to  hear  and  report  on  the  suit  to  the  Tribunal  of  Com' 
merce,  before  whom  I  had  been  cited  by  Lechesne, — a  proceeding  wholly 
illegal,  my  lawyers  asserted,  as  neither  party  to  the  action  was  a  merchant. 
My  counsel  wished  to  demur  to  the  jurisdiction,  saying  that  the  Tribunal 
was  not  a  court  of  law,  and  always  decided  for  a  Frenchman  against  a 
foreigner,  no  matter  how  unjustly.  At  length,  however,  when  my  docu- 
ments arrived  from  New- York,  they  could  hold  off  no  longer,  but  went 
before  the  officer  in  question,  where  my  opponents  were  most  reluctant  to 
meet  them,  asking  for  time  to  send  to  America  for  documents  also!  We 
understood  that  this  was  only  a  pretext  to  avoid  a  judgment  for  costs, — they 


THE  GLACIERS.  281 

did  not  really  want  to  send  to  America,  and  did  not  send.  We  let  them 
off  on  that  excuse,  however,  and  I  came  away, — leaving  the  suit  stone  dead 
I  rejoice  that  imprisonment  for  debt  was  recently  abolished  in  France, — 
I  trust  forever.  I  doubt  that  it  ever  made  one  debtor  even  outwardly 
honest ;  I  am  sure  it  often  compelled  the  relatives  and  friends  of  prodigals 
to  pay  debts  which  should  never  have  been  contracted.  It  is  wrong — it  is 
immoral — to  trust  those  who  do  not  deserve  credit, — it  is  doubly  wrong  to 
impose  the  payment  of  such  debts  upon  some  frugal  uncle  or  brother  of 
the  debtor,  in  pity  for  that  debtor's  weeping  wife  and  children.  "Let 
every  tub  stand  on  its  own  bottom,"  is  a  sound  rule,  which  imprisonment 
for  debt  tends  strongly  to  subvert.  Men  are  trusted  who  should  not  be,  on 
the  calculation,  "  I  can  get  my  pay  out  of  his  relatives  by  putting  him 
into  jail ;"  hence  tavern-scores  and  merchants'  accounts  where  cash  down 
would  have  precluded  extravagance  and  dissipation.  The  civilized  world 
is  not  yet  prepared  for  the  repeal  of  all  laws  designed  to  enforce  the  col- 
lection of  simple  debts  (not  trusts) ;  but  this  reform  must  come  in  due 
time,  when  mankind  will  wonder  why  it  could  so  long  have  been  resisted. 
False  credit — credit  to  those  who  do  not  deserve,  and  will  be  rather 
harmed  than  helped  by  it — is  the  bane  of  our  civilization.  Every  second 
man  you  meet  is  struggling  with  debts  which  he  never  should  have  con- 
tracted. We  need  a  legal  reform,  which  will  greatly  dimmish  our  current 
facilities  for  running  into  debt. 

In  the  latter  part  of  June,  Mr.  Greeley  visited  the  Alps 
again,  this  time  with  his  family.  The  journey  and  the  stay 
at  Chamonix  are  thus  described: 

On  my  later  visit  to  Europe,  I  left  Paris  with  my  family  in  June ;  trav- 
elled by  rail  to  Dijon,  capital  of  the  kingdom  of  Burgundy  that  was, — the 
palace  of  whose  kings  is  now  a  museum  of  deeply  interesting  relics  of 
that  monarchy, — and,  after  spending  a  bright  day  there,  we  took  diligence 
at  9  P.  M.,  were  toiling  up  the  Jura  next  forenoon,  and  were  soon  rattling 
down  their  southeastern  slope,  whence  we  reached  Geneva  before  night. 
Passing  thence  up  the  valley  of  the  Arve  to  Chamonix,  we  spent  five  days 
there  in  deeply  interested  observation  of  the  adjacent  peaks  and  glaciers. 
I  gave  one  day  to  a  visit  to  Montanvert  and  the  Mer  de  Glace  (Sea  of  Ice), 
across  which  cattle  are  annually  driven  —  a  practical  path  being  first  made 
by  cutting  ice  and  filling  crevices — to  a  sunny  southern  slope  ("the  Gar- 
den"), 9,000  feet  above  tide  level,  on  an  adjacent  mountain,  where  they  are 
pastured  till  snow  falls  and  lies,  and  then  driven  back  to  the  valley  whence 
they  came.  The  ice  of  the  Mer  de  Glace  is  so  frequently  seamed  with  deep 
cracks  and  crevices  as  to  afford  most  unsafe  footing  for  novices  in  Alpine 
pedestrianism ;  and  I,  for  one,  was  glad  to  turn  about,  when  I  had  gone 
but  half-way  across  it,  and  regain  the  solid  ground  I  had  eagerly  left.  You 
climb  thence  nearly  a  thousand  feet  to  a  perch  known  as  Montanvert, 
whence  a  good  view  is  had,  in  clear-weather,  of  several  lofty  peaks,  Mont 
Blanc  included ;  and  when  I  had  thence  made  my  way  down  to  Chamonix 


LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

(you  ascend  on  horse  or  mule  back,  but  descend  slowly  on  foot),  I  was  aa 
weary  as  any  one  need  wish  to  be. 

During  my  absence  on  this  trip,  my  wife  had  undertaken  to  visit,  with 
our  children,  the  Glacier  de  Boissons,  which  seems  scarcely  a  mile  distant 
from  the  hotels  at  Chamonix,  and  easily  accessible ;  but  she  had  failed  to 
reach  it,  lost  her  way  and  been  obliged  to  hire  a  peasant-woman  to  pilot 
her,  and  carry  our  fagged-out  younger  child,  back  to  our  hotel.  I  laughed 
at  this  misadventure  when  we  met,  and  volunteered  to  lead  the  party  next 
morning  straight  up  to  the  glacier  aforesaid,  so  that  they  might  put  theii 
hands  on  it;  but,  on  trying  it,  I  failed  miserably.  So  many  deep  ravines 
and  steep  moraines  were  found  to  bar  our  way,  where  all  seemed  smooth 
and  level  from  our  hotel,  and  the  actual  was  so  much  greater  than  the 
apparent  distance,  that  I  gave  up,  after  an  hour's  rugged  clambering,  and 
contented  myself  with  asserting  that  I  could  reach  the  glacier  by  myself, — 
as  I  still  presume  I  could,  though  I  never  tried.  Either  of  the  great  gla- 
ciers is  so  large  that  it  dwarfs  everything  around  it;  belittling  obstacles 
and  distances  to  an  extent  elsewhere  incredible. 

The  Glacier  des  Bois  is  said  to  measure  over  fifty  miles  from  the  giant 
snow-drift  wherein  it  originates,  filling  an  indentation  or  gully  leading 
down  the  east  side  of  Mont  Blanc,  to  the  very  bed  of  the  Arve  in  the 
Chamonix  valley.  Indeed,  the  Her  de  Glace  itself  may  be  considered  a 
branch,  if  not  the  principal  source,  of  the  little  river,  and  is  approaches 
by  following  up  the  bed  of  the  stream  for  a  couple  of  miles  or  so  above 
the  village,  then  stepping  from  one  to  another  of  the  giant  boulders, 
brought  down  by  the  glacier  from  the  icy  region  above,  and  which  here  fill 
the  spacious  bed  of  the  stream.  I  spent  a  forenoon  here,  watching  the 
gradual  dissolution  of  the  ice  by  the  warm  breath  of  the  valley,  and 
noting  how  moraines  are  made. 

A  moraine  is  a  ridge  or  bank  of  earth  and  stones,  averaging  four  to  eight 
feet  high,  and  perhaps  ten  to  twenty  in  width  at  the  base,  which  is  uni- 
formly found  bordering  a  glacier  on  either  side,  with  one  far  larger — 
oftener  two  or  more  —  at  its  lower  extremity.  It  is  so  unfailingly  sepa- 
rated by  distances  of  ten  to  twenty  feet  from  the  glacier,  that  the  green 
observer  finds  it  difficult  to  comprehend  that  it  is  naturally  formed  of  the 
points  and  fragments  of  rock  broken  off  by  the  giant  masses  of  ice  in  their 
imperceptible,  yet  constant  progress  —  at  the  average  rate  of  six  feet  or  so 
per  day_ — from  the  snow-drifts  cradled  between  the  higher  peaks  to  the 
deep  valleys,  green  with  grass,  and  crimson  with  Alpine  flowers. 

But  steady  observation  detects  a  constant  wearing  away,  in  warm 
weather,  of  the  lower  part  of  the  glacier  facing  the  valley,  and  a  conse- 
quent formation  of  cavities  and  channels  therein,  whereby  the  stones  are 
loosened  and  allowed  to  precipitate  themselves.  But,  while  the  waterfalls 
directly  downward,  the  stones  fall  outward,  or,  striking  a  lower  slope  of 
ice,  are  so  deflected  from  the  perpendicular  that  they  rest  at  last  at  some 
distance  outward  from  the  base  of  the  glacier.  Hence  moraines. 

We  were  in  Chamonix,  I  believe,  from  the  20th  to  the  25th  of  June,  — 
too  early  by  a  month.  Snow  fell  repeatedly,  though  lightly;  rain  fre- 


LONDON.  283 

quently  and  heavily ;  the  mountain  tops  were  usually  shrouded  in  cloud 
and  fog;  and  we  only  caught  a  clear  view  of  the  summit  of  Mont  Blanc 
on  the  morning  of  our  departure.  Swamp  Alder  (a  large  shrub  with  us) 
here  attaining  the  size  of  a  considerable  tree,  so  that  it  is  frequently  split 
into  fence-rails;  and  stretches  of  meadow,  carpeted  and  blazing  with  the 
deep  scarlet  of  innumerable  flowers,  —  are  among  my  recollections  of  that 
lofty,  high-walled  valley,  so  deeply  embosomed  in  the  Alps,  and  so  rich  in 
everything  that  renders  the  vicinage  of  mountains  attractive  to  civilized 
man. 

Returning  to  Geneva,  the  party  took  steamboat  on  Lake 
Leman  to  Lusanne,  whence  they  journeyed  by  diligence  to 
Berne.  Thence  they  intended  to  journey  to  Interlachen  and 
the  Bernese  Oberland,  but  the  sudden  illness  of  one  of  the 
children  prevented.  They  hastened  back  to  the  lovely  little 
city  of  Lusanne,  where  Mr.  Greeley  left  his  family,  and  by 
'  Neufchatel,  Basle,  and  Strasburg,  proceeded  to  Paris.  There 
he  remained  two  or  three  weeks,  and  then  went  to  London. 
His  letters  from  London  show  that  he  thought  vastly  more  of 
that  city  than  of  Paris.  "  London,"  he  said,  "  deepens  its 
impressions  upon  me  with  each  visit;  nay,  I  rarely  spend  a 
day  within  its  vast  circumference  without  increasing  wonder 
and  admiration.  It  is  the  capital,  if  not  of  the  civilized,  cer- 
tainly of  the  commercial  world,  civilized  and  otherwise.  To 
her  wharves  the  raw  produce  of  all  climes  and  countries,  to 
her  vaults  the  gold,  of  California  and  Australia,  to  her  cabinets 
the  gems  of  Q-oloo^da  <,  i;d  Brazil,  insensibly  gravitate.  From 
this  mighty  heart  radiate  the  main  arteries  of  the  world's  trade; 
a  great  crash  here  brings  down  leading  and  long-established 
houses  in  the  South  Pacific  or  the  Yellow  Sea.  I  dropped  in  to- 
day on  an  old  friend  whom  1  had  known  ten  or  fifteen  years  ago  as 
a  philosophic  radical  and  social  reformer  in  America.  I  found 
him  in  a  great  sugar-house  under  tiie  shadow  of  the  Bank,  cor- 
recting a  Price  Current  whi^h  he  edits,  having  just  made  up  a 
telegraphic  dispatch  for  his  house's  correspondents  in  Bombay. 
I  found  him  calm  and  wise  as  ever;  more  practical,  some  would 
say,  but  still  hopeful  of  the  good  time  coming;  he  had  been 
several  years  with  that  house,  and  he  told  me  his  income  was 
quite  satisfactory,  and  that  his  eldest  son  was  doing  very  well 
in  Australia.  *  *  *  There  is  much  mistaken  pride  and 


284  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELET. 

false  dignity  in  England;  but  if  a  Briton  insists  on  being 
proud  of  London,  I  shall  not  quarrel  with  him  on  that  head/' 

He  thought  that  the  better  order  of  speaking  in  the  House 
of  Commons  surpassed  that  of  the  American  House  of  Rep- 
resentatives, but  that  the  average  ability  in  London  as  evinced 
in  speaking  was  below  that  of  Washington  City.  The  English, 
he  thought,  were  unskilful  in  varnishing  vice. 

Of  Paris  he  said: 

Paris  is  the  Paradise  of  thoughtless  boys  with  full  pockets ;  but  I,  if  ever 
thoughtless,  had  ceased  to  be  a  boy  some  time  ere  I  first  greeted  the  "  gay, 
bright,  airy  city  of  the  Seine."  I  presume  I  could  now  enjoy  a  week  of 
the  careless,  sunny  life  of  her  mob  of  genteel  idlers;  but  a  month  of  it 
would  sate  and  bore^  me.  To  rise  reluctantly  to  a  late  breakfast;  trifle 
away  the  day,  from  noon  to  5  p.  M.,  in  riding  and  sight-seeing;  dine  elabo- 
rately; and  thenceforward  spend  the  evening  at  theatre,  opera,  or  party,  is' 
a  routine  that  soon  tells  on  one  who  is  indurated  in  the  habit  of  making 
the  most  of  every  working-hour.  I  envy  no  man  his  happiness;  I  envy 
least  of  all  the  pleasure-sekeer,  who  chases  his  nimble,  coquettish  butter- 
fly, year  in,  year  out,  along  the  Boulevards  and  around  the  "  Places  "  of 
the  giddy  metropolis  of  France. 

He  embarked  at  Liverpool  under  the  deep  impression  that 
something  had  gone  wrong  with  his  family,  —  a  presentiment 
which  gave  him  solicitude  throughout  the  homeward  voyage, 
which,  on  account  of  sea-sickness,  was  one  of  even  unusua. 
torture.  Upon  reaching  New- York,  he  learned  that  his  mother 
had  died  upon  the  day  of  his  departure  tVore.  liverpool. 


CHAPTER   XVI. 

CAMPAIGN  OF  1853— THE  WHIG  PARTY  EXIT. 

The  Dawn  of  a  New  Political  Era— The  Political  Canvass  of  185$— The 
Nominations  —  Mr.  Greeley  Mildly  Supports  General  Scott,  and  "Spits 
Upon  the  Platform"  —  His  Individual  Platform  —  A  Lively  Campaign 
Terminating  in  Utter  Rout. 

HORACE  GREETXT  bad  now  cooperated  with  the  Whig  party 
since  its  organization,  but  from  the  year  1848  with  diminished 
zeal.  Theretofore,  his  "  abstractions  "  had  been  upon  subjects 
other  than  political;  his  "visions"  had  turned  his  eyes  upon 
other  scenes.  His  philanthropy,  broad  and  earnest  as  it  ever 
was,  had  not  been  practically  exercised  in  behalf  of  the  slave. 
He  had  thought  closely,  worked  with  singular  fervour  in 
behalf  of  the  labouring  man.  That  which  was  called  his 
Socialism  was,  with  Jiim,  the  Emancipation  of  Labour;  that 
which  was  derisively  called  his  "  Fourierite  bill "  was  the  germ 
of  the  beneficent  Homestead  policy.  Herein  he  was  so  far  in 
advance  of  his  times,  until  at  last  he  dragged  the  times  up  to 
him,  that,  as  is  usual  in  such  cases,  he  was.  the  common  butt 
of  satire  and  obloquy.  But  in  politics,  he  was  extremely 
practical.  He  doubtless  considered  the  abolitionists  "  fanatics." 
He  surely  saw  the  dawn  of  a  new  political  era  almost  as  early 
as  any  one.  If  this  be  claiming  too  much,  it  will  be  agreed 
that,  almost  as  soon  as  any  one,  he  saw  the  sun  go  down  on 
the  old  era  with  abiding  trust  that  it  would  soon  again  shine 
forth  in  a  brighter,  better  day. 

With  him  the  political  canvass  of  1852  was  the  night 
between  the  old  era  of  small  issues  and  the, new  one  of  great 
questions,  upon  the  settlement  of  which  depended  the  cause  of 
freedom  and  the  eventual  happiness  of  all  mankind. 

This  presidential  campaign,  so  far  as  the  two  great  political 
parties  were  concerned,  was  a  fraud.  The  people  were  delib- 
erately deceived  by  both  those  parties,  as  after  events  demon- 


286  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GKEELET. 

strated.  The  Democratic  partj  was  the  first  to  meet  in  con- 
vention. The  meeting  occurred  at  Baltimore  on  the  1st  of 
June,  and  after  a  long  struggle, — no  less  than  forty-nine 
ballots, —  resulted  in  the  nomination  of  General  Franklin 
Pierce,  of  New  Hampshire,  as  candidate  for  President.  On 
the  second  ballot,  Senator  William  !R.  King,  of  Alabama,  was 
selected  as  the  candidate  for  Yice-President.  Mr.  Pierce  was 
a  man  of  amiable  character  and  respectable  talents,  but 
was  little  known  to  the  country.  Mr.  King  was  a  sagacious 
statesman  of  the  pro-slavery  school;  a  gentleman  of  noble 
nature,  but  sinking  under  a  load  of  physical  disease,  which 
laid  him  low  in  death  before  he  could  assume  the  duties  of  th»> 
office  to  which- he  was  elected.  ^'f'^  * 

The  Whigs  held  their  convention  in  the  same  city,  on  "tlie 
16th  of  the  same  month.  They  had  made  a  great  deal  of  run' 
of  the  Democrats  for  being  so  long  unable  to  agree  upon  a 
candidate.  They  were  too  fast;  for,  though  their  rules  only 
required  a  majority  to  nominate,  they  could  not  agree  upon  a 
candidate  until  more  than  fifty  ballots  had  been  taken.  Gen- 
eral Winfield  Scott  was  successful,  his  principal  competitors 
being  President  Millard  Fillmore,  and  the  illustrious  states- 
man Daniel  Webster.  Hon.  William  A.  Graham,  of  North 
Carolina,  was  nominated  for  Vice-President.  General  Scott 
appeared  to  Mr.  Greeley  a  preposterous  candidate;  and  Mr. 
Greeley  does  not  seem  to  have  been  in  the  wrong.  A  great 
soldier,  General  Scott  was  wonderfully  unfitted  for  the  conduct 
of  civil  affairs. 

The  convention  of  the  Free-Soil  Democracy  was  held  at 
Pittsburgh  in  August.  Henry  Wilson,  of  Massachusetts,  after- 
wards the  distinguished  Senator  and  Vice-President  of  the 
United  States,  presided.  An  eloquent  orator,  a  faithful  friend 
of  freedom  and  of  the  labouring  man,  and  ever  believed  to  be 
a  person  of  unflinching  pluck  until  his  courage  and  much 
of  his  manhood  oozed  out  at  the  ends  of  his  fingers  when  con- 
fronted by  that  black  knight  called  Credit  Mobilier,  Mr. 
Wilson  had  at  this  time  recently  entered  upon  a  career  of  fame 
and  usefulness,  whose  sad  ending  must  be  forever  lamented. 
The  convention  over  which  he  presided  nominated  John  P. 


A   PRIVATE   PLATFORM.  287 

Hale,  of  New  Hampshire,  for  President,  and  George  W.  Julian, 
of  Indiana,  for  Yice-President.  The  former  became  one  of  the 
most  famous  of  Senators,  and  the  latter  won  more  substantial 
and  enduring  if  less  brilliant  renown  in  the  House  of  Repre- 
sentatives. The  convention  adopted  a  platform  of  ringing 
principles  worthy  of  a  great  party,  whereas  the  platforms  ol 
the  Whigs  and  Democrats,  were  trifling,  subservient,  and 
worse. 

Mr.  Greeley's  logical  position  in  this  campaign  was  with  the 
Free-Soilers.  Nevertheless  he  supported  the  Whig  candidates, 
but  spat  upon  the  platform.  He  assigned  these  reasons  for 
supporting  Messrs.  Scott  and  Graham: 

"1.  They  can  be  elected,  and  the  others  can't. 

"2.  They  are  openly  and  thoroughly  for  PROTECTION  TO  HOME  IN- 
DUSTRY, while  the  others  (judged  by  their  supporters)  lean  to  Free  Trade. 

"  3.  Scott  and  Graham  are  backed  by  the  general  support  of  those  who 
hold  with  us,  that  government  may  and  should  do  much  positive  good." 

It  is  clear  that  at  this  time  Mr.  Greeley  thought  the  claims 
upon  statesmanship  of  a  few  manufactures  entitled  to  greater 
consideration  than  a  v,ast  system  of  nameless  wrongs  enslaving 
three  millions  of  persons.  His  own  platform  was  tersely  set 
forth  in  an  article  in  The  Tribune: 

"  OUR  PLATFORM. 

"  I.  As  to  the  Tariff: — Duties  on  Imports — specific  so  far  as  practicable, 
affording  ample  protection  to  undeveloped  or  peculiarly  exposed  branches 
of  our  National  Industry,  and  adequate  revenue  for  the  support  of  the 
government  and  the  payment  of  its  debts.  Low  duties,  as  a  general  rule, 
on  rude,  bulky  staples,  whereof  the  cost  of  transportation  is  of  itself  equiv- 
alent to  a  heavy  impost,  and  high  duties  on  such  fabrics,  wares,  etc.,  as 
come  into  depressing  competition  with  our  own  depressed  infantile  or 
endangered  pursuits. 

"  II.  As  to  National  Works ; — Liberal  appropriations  yearly  for  the 
improvement  of  rivers  and  harbours,  and  such  eminently  national  enter- 
prises  as  the  Saut  Ste.  Marie  canal  and  the  Pacific  railroad  from  the  Mis- 
sissippi.  Cut  down  the  expenditures  for  forts,  ships,  troops,  and  warlike 
enginery  of  all  kinds,  and  add  largely  to  those  for  works  which  do  not 
'  perish  in  the  using,'  but  will  remain  for  ages  to  benefit  our  people, 
strengthen  the  Union,  and  contribute  far  more  to  the  national  defence  than 
the  costly  machinery  of  war  ever  could. 

"  III.    As  to  Foreign  Policy: — 'Do  unto  others  [the  weak  and  oppressed 


288  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

as  well  as  the  powerful  and  mighty]  as  we  would  have  them  do  unto  us.' 
No  shuffling,  no  evasion  of  duties  nor  shirking  of  responsibilities,  but  a 
firm  front  to  despots,  a  prompt  rebuke  to  every  outrage  on  the  law  of 
Nations,  and  a  generous,  active  sympathy  with  the  victims  of  tyranny 
and  usurpation. 

"  IV.  As  to  Slavery : — No  interference  by  Congress  with  its  existence  in 
any  slave  State,  but  a  firm  and  vigilant  resistance  to  its  legalization  in 
any  national  Territory,  or  the  acquisition  of  any  foreign  Territory  wherein 
slavery  may  exist.  A  perpetual  protest  against  the  hunting  of  fugitive 
slaves  in  free  States  as  an  irresistible  cause  of  agitation,  ill  feeling,  and 
alienation  between  the  North  and  the  South.  A  firm,  earnest,  inflexible 
testimony,  in  common  with  the  whole  non-slaveholding  Christian  world, 
that  human  slavery,  though  legally  protected,  is  morally  wrong,  and  ought 
to  be  speedily  terminated. 

"  V.    As  to  State  Eights : — More  regard  for  and  less  cant  about  them. 

"  VI.  ONE  PRESIDENTIAL  TERM,  and  no  man  a  candidate  for  any  office 
while  wielding  the  vast  patronage  of  the  national  executive. 

"  VII.  REFORM  IN  CONGRESS  :— Payment  by  the  session,  with  a  rigour- 
ous  deduction  for  each  day's  absence,  and  a  reduction  and  straightening 
of  mileage.  We  would  suggest  $2,000  compensation  for  the  first  (or  long), 
and  $1,000  for  the  second  (or  short)  session;  with  ten  cents  per  mile  for 
travelling  (by  a  bee-line)  to  and  from  Washington." 

The  campaign  was  an  animated  one.  Many  Whigs  were 
deceived,  sincerely  believing"  that  General  Scott  would  be 
elected.  The  Tribune  warmed  up  during  the  canvass,  and 
made  a  spirited  fight  for  the  success  of  the  party,  not  even 
manifesting  disgust  upon  the  receipt  of  the  reports  of  a  few 
public  addresses  delivered  by  General  Scott,  the  ill  taste  of 
some  of  whose  expressions  gave  the  opposition  great  food  for 
laughter  and  his  friends  large  excuse  for  a  free  use  of  energetic 
epithets.  The  result  was  overwhelming  defeat  of  the  Whigs, 
'  General  Scott  receiving  the  votes  of  only  four  States — Massa- 
chusetts, Vermont,  Kentucky,  and  Tennessee.  Had  the  Free- 
Soil  votes  which  were  cast  for  Mr.  Hale  been  cast  for  Scott,  he 
would  even  then  have  received  only  the  votes  of  Connecticut 
and  Ohio  in  addition. 

Mr.  Greeley  correctly  regarded  this  utter  rout  as  decisive  of 
the  fate  of  the  Whig  party.  The  Tribune  soon  began  to  speak 
of  "  the  late  Whig  party;"  and  it  was  not  long  till  The  Tribune 
Almanac  took  the  place  of  that  which  for  many  years,  under 
the  name  of  The  Whig  Almanac,  had  been  the  best  compen- 


THE  NEW   ERA. 


289 


dium  of  political  statistics  of  the  country,  recognized  as  an 
authority  by  the  intelligent  of  all  parties.  For  the  cause  of 
Labour,  for  Free  Homes,  for  Temperance,  for  Protection,  for  a 
wider  freedom  of  opinion  and  of  speech  than  conventional 
trammels  had  yet  allowed,  for  the  Slave,  Mr.  Greeley  and  his 
journal  now  laboured  more  efficiently  than  before.  lie  had 
enlisted  under  a  better  banner,  and  in  the  great  conflicts  of  the 
new  political  era,  took  position  at  the  front  and  maintained  it 
to  the  last. 

19 


WHITELAW  REID.— Sec  page  183. 


CHAPTEK   XVII. 

MR  GREELEY  AND  THE  NEW  POLITICAL  ERA. 

Review  of  Mr.  Greeley's  Past  Political  Life  — Of  the  Parties  of  the  Times 
— The  Day  of  Small  Things — The  Compromise  Measures  of  1850 — 
Mr.  Greeley's  Opinion  of  Them  —  Renewed  Agitation  of  the  Slavery 
Question — The  Political  Influence  of  Mrs.  Stowe's  Novel,  "Uncle 
Tom's  Cabin  "  —  Of  the  Public  Press — Mr.  Greeley  Departs  on  the  NCTT 
Departure. 

MR.  GREELEY'S  political  life,  thus  far,  had  been  passed  most 
of  the  time  in  the  minority.  From  the  time  lie  cast  his  first 
vote  up  to  the  dissolution  of  the  Whig  party,  he  had  been  on 
the  losing  side  at  every  election  except  two.  The  untimely 
death  of  President  Harrison,  followed  by  the  apostacy  of  Presi- 
dent Tyler,  made  the  magnificent  triumph  of  1840  something 
worse  than  a  barren  victory.  He  only  brought  up  the  rear  in 
the  campaign  which  resulted  in  the  success  of  General  Taylor. 

If  he  had  not  been  on  the  winning  side  in  respect  of  men, 
he  could  show  very  little,  in  the  recognized  policy  of  the 
nation,  for  which,  up  to  this  time,  the  nation  was  indebted  to 
his  mind  or  his  influence.  In  truth,  the  two  parties,  forming 
the  bulk  of  the  people,  which  contended  for  the  possession  of 
power  during  these  years,  were  all  the  time  in  dispute  over 
abstract  questions  of  government,  in  which  the  Democracy 
were  quite  generally  in  the  right,  and  over  practical  questions, 
the  settlement  of  which,  one  way  or  the  other,  would  have 
made  no  great  difference,  perhaps,  in  respect  of  the  develop- 
ment of  the  country  and  the  permanent  establishment  of  free 
institutions.  "We  are  told  to  not  despise  the  day  of  small 
things.  Perhaps  this  was  about  the  only  wise  injunction  the 
political  disputants  of  the  times  under  review  generally  obeyed. 
It  is  astonishing  how  much  eloquence  was  poured  forth  in 
behalf  of  dredging  the  sand  out  of  harbours  and  of  removing 
the  snags  out  of  rivers.  There  was  no  end  of  caustic  invective 


SMALL  ISSUES.  291 

against  the  government  of  the  United  States  for  sins  which 
were  justly  chargeable  against  drunken  pilots  or  sleepy  com- 
manders of  vessels.  What  was  supposed  to  be  the  beginning 
of  a  magnificent  system  of  internal  improvements,  was  inau- 
gurated by  august  ceremonies,  the  President  of  the  United 
States  himself  "  breaking  ground  "  on  a  "  National  Road,"  by 
the  side  of  which  men  may  now  travel  by  rail,  and  look  in 
vain  upon  that  obsolete  thoroughfare  for  so  much  evidence  of 
domestic  commerce  as  might  be  shown  by  a  pea-nut  cart, 
drawn  or  driven  by  an  exile  of  Erin.  Great  ingenuity  was 
exhibited  in  the  discussion  of  the  tariff  question,  that  of 
national  banks,  and  other  similar  topics.  Vituperation  was 
elevated  into  one  of  the  Coarse  Arts.  It  makes  one  ashamed 
of  his  race  and  his  country  to  read  what  the  Whigs  said  and 
wrote  about  Andrew  Jackson,  and  what  the  Democrats  said 
and  wrote  about  Henry  Clay;  what  the  Democrats  said  of 
Harrison,  and  what  the  Whigs  said  of  Yan  Buren.  Thus  were 
the  minds  of  the  people  occupied  upon  trivial  topics,  and  their 
attention  called  away  from  that  great  wrong  whose  baleful 
influence  was  as  subtle  as  it  was  prodigious.  But  if  the  abuse 
of  «ach  other  by  the  great  contending  parties  were  so  disrepu- 
table, what  shall  be  said  of  the  treatment  of  the  abolitionists 
by  both  these  parties!  The  most  abused  of  all  men  of  the 
republic  were  those  who  best  represented  republicanism ;  who 
were  devoted  most  wisely  to  the  true  interests  of  the  nation; 
whose  principles  embraced  truths  of  paramount  importance, 
of  moral  and  political  grandeur,  the  constant  subversion  of 
which  by  the  republic,  was  unspeakably  shameful;  the  constant 
hatred  of  which  by  the  political  parties  of  the  times  was 
simply  horrible.  Amid  the  tintinabulations  of  all  the  little 
political  bells,  the  ear  of  the  nation  was  distracted  from  the 
deep  and  awful  rumbling  of  the  coming  earthquake.  Men 
went  on  mobbing  abolitionists  quite  as  of.  course,  and  all 
was  peace. 

Mr.  Greeley's  singular  devotion  to  the  policy  of  Protection 
and  to  Henry  Clay  particularly,  closed  his  eyes  against  the 
issue  upon  which  the  life  of  the  nation  hung.  Even  the  Com- 
promise Measures  of  1850  did  not  wholly  undeceive  him.  He 


292  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELET. 

failed  to  see  even  then  that  all  that  there  was  of  permanent 
importance  in  those  measures, — the  Fugitive  Slave  Law, — was 
an  unconditional  surrender  of  the  republic  to  the  Slave  Power. 
And  at  so  late  a  period  in  his  life  as  that  in  which  he  wrote 
"  The  American  Conflict,"  he  is  evidently  reluctant  in  con- 
necting Mr.  Clay's  reputation  with  a  corrupt  monstrosity  in 
legislation  and  morals  which  even  the  great  name  of  his 
favourite  statesman'  should  not  be  permitted  to  shield  from 
lasting  opprobrium.1 

It  may  well  be  inferred  that  if  Mr.  Greeley  would  speak  of 
one  of  Mr.  Clay's  measures  as  deserving  of  lasting  oppro- 
brium, and  this  after  yearn  of  reflection,  he  did  not  at  the  time 
speak  in  honeyed  phrase  of  it.  The  whole  country  was 
agitated,  indeed,  upon  the  subject  of  slavery,  and  the  people 
of  the  North,  after  the  passage  of  the  Compromise  Measures, 
gradually  cut  loose  from  former  political  ideas  and  began  to 
place  themselves  in  readiness  for  a  revolution. 

One  of  the  most  potent  influences  in  the  creation  of  a 
thorough  anti-slavery  sentiment  among  the  people  was  a  work 

1  See  The  American  Conflict,  Vol.  1,  Chap.  XV.  "  It  was  entirely  proper," 
he  here  says,  "  that  Congress  should  provide  at  once  for  the  temporary  gov- 
ernment of  all  the  territories  newly  acquired  from  Mexico ;  and  there  waa 
no  radical  objection  to  doing  this  in  one  bill,  if  that  should  seem 
advisable.  As  the  establishment  of  a  definite  boundary  between  New 
Mexico  and  Texas  was  essential  to  the  tranquillity  and  security  of  the 
Territory,  that  object  might  fairly  be  contemplated  in  the  act  providing  a 
civil  government  therefor.  But  why  Texas  should  be  paid  ten  millions 
of  dollars  for  relinquishing  her  pretensions  to  territory  never  possessed 
by  nor  belonging  to  her, — territory  which  had  been  first  acquired  from 
Mexico  by  the  forces  and  then  bought  of  her  by  the  money  of  the  Union — 
is  not  obvious;  and  why  this  payment,  if  made  at  all,  should  be  a  make- 
weight in  a  bargain  covering  a  variety  of  arrangements  with  which  it  had 
no  proper  connection,  is  still  less  explicable.  And  when,  on  the  back  of 
this  was  piled  an  act  to  provide  new  facilities  for  slave-catching  in  the 
Free  States,  ostensibly  balanced  by  another  which  required  the  slave- 
traders  of  Washington  to  remove  their  jails  and  auction-rooms  across  the 
Potomac  to  that  dull  old  dwarf  of  a  city  which  had  recently  been  retro- 
ceded  to  Virginia,  as  if  on  purpose  to  facilitate  this  arrangement,  the  net 
product  was  a  corrupt  monstrosity  in  legislation  and  morals  which  even 
the  great  name  of  Henry  Clay  should  not  shield  from  lasting  oppro- 
brium." 


"UNCLE  TOM'S  CABIN."  293 

of  America's  most  illustrious  female  writer.  I  can  only  refer 
to  Mrs.  Harriet  Beecher  Stowe's  novel  of  "  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin." 
This  was  first  published  as  a  serial  in  The  National  Era  news- 
paper, a  weekly  journal  of  the  National  Capital,  edited  with 
great  ability  and  sublime  courage  by  Dr.  Gamaliel  Bailey. 
The  story  ran  through  considerable  portions  of  the  years  1851 
and  1852,  and  attracted  wide  interest  from  the  beginning. 
Upon  publication  in  book  form  it  had  a  vast  popularity.  The 
sensation  it  created  has  never  been  approached  by  an  American 
literary  work.  So  eager  were  persons  to  get  the  thrilling  story 
of  "  Uncle  Tom,"  that  one  copy  of  the  book  served  the  purpose 
of  many  copies,  by  being  read  aloud  to  parties  congregated  for 
the  purpose,  the  demand  for  the  novel  being,  during  many 
weeks,  perhaps  months,  immensely  greater  than  the  supply. 
This  most  masterly  plea  for  humanity  which  genius  has  pro- 
duced was  unable  to  lift  the  nation  at  once  out  of  the  slough 
of  trifling  and  wrong  into  which  it  had  been  cast  by  political 
parties,  but  it  created  an  anti-slavery  sentiment  so  intense  and 
widely  spread,  that  further  encroachments  of  the  Slave  Power 
were  thereafter  impossible  except  by  means  of  armed  revolu- 
tion. To  the  genius  of  Mrs.  Stowe  more  than  to  any  other  one 
cause,  the  origin  of  the  Republican  party  may  be  assigned. 

And  by  this  time,  the  influence  of  the  public  press,  as  the 
educator  of  the  masses  of  the  body  politic  had  become  palpa- 
bly manifest.  Undoubtedly  the  means  of  popular  education 
supplied  to  most  of  the  children  of  the  republic  at  the  lightest 
possible  cost,  to  the  poor  especially,  had  done  incalculable 
service  in  behalf  of  general  intelligence.  But  it  is  certainly 
true  that  the  fact  of  the  adult  population,  in  a  few  years  after 
the  remarkable  development  of  the  press  consequent  upon  the 
invention  of  the  electric  telegraph  and  the  wonderful  journal- 
istic enterprise  which  followed,  rapidly  reaching  a  high  piano 
of  intelligence  and  manly  independence  of  thought,  —  it 
is  undoubtedly  true,  that  this  magnificent  fact  is  largely  due 
to  the  influence  of  the  public  press.  As  the  people  became 
more  intelligent,  more  independent  in  opinion,  the  power  of 
party,  of  course,  correspondingly  diminished.  When  the  press 
took  position  above  party  it  became  at  once  more  influential 


294  TJFE  OF  HORACE   GREELEY. 

with  the  people  and  more  truly  representative  of  them.  And 
as  amongst  an  intelligent  people  there  is  always  more  of  wis- 
dom and  statesmanship  than  amongst  all  the  politicians,  and 
as  they  now  had  representative  journals,  it  did  not  take  them 
long  to  perceive  that  old  parties  had  become  obsolete;  boy- 
clothes  into  which  it  would  have  been  impossible  for  the  now 
puissant  nation  to  place  itself  without  making  of  itself  a  ridic- 
ulous spectacle. 

Nor  will  there  be  any  to  deny  this  claim  of  magnificent 
power  on  the  part  of  the  press,  when  they  once  seriously  reflect 
upon  the  nature  of  its  operations;  its  simple  yet  majestic 
means  of  influence.  All  will  readily  agree  that  if  a  skilful 
orator  were  to  address  large  audiences  of  willing  hearers  every 
day,  he  would  acquire  vast  influence.  A  great  journal  speaks 
to  more  persons  every  day  of  the  week,  every  day  of  the  year, 
than  could  be  heard  by  any  orator  though  he  had  the  voice  of 
Jupiter  Tonans.  And  this  not  upon  a  single  topic  but  upon  a 
variety  of  topics,  many  of  which  must  of  necessity  be  of  great 
value  and  interest  to  all  the  people.  Libri  cibus  animo.  News- 
papers have  become  the  daily  intellectual  food  of  all  the  citizens 
of  enlightened  Christendom.  The  orator,  except  by  thfe  aid  of 
the  press,  can  only  influence  those  who  stand  round  about  him. 
The  journalist  has  a  greater  immediate  audience,  but  his  words 
reach  afar  off,  as  weighty  in  the  uttermost  parts  of  the  land  or 
of  the  earth,  as  in  the  deep  basement  where  they  issue  from 
that  marvel  of  modern  machinery,  the  Hoe  Press.  This  orator, 
with  this  vast  audience,  is  of  a  generous  nature,  and  comes  to 
you  instead  of  requiring  you  to  come  to  him.  Thus  with  the 
rising  and  the  setting  of  the  sun  he  visits  the  hearthstone  of 
every  intelligent  family  —  a  welcome  visitor.  When  we  con- 
sider, therefore,  the  great  and  varied  contents  of  most  of  our 
public  journals,  and  the  marvellous  means  of  their  diifusion 
among  the  people,  we  cannot  help  agreeing  that  the  newspaper 
press  is,  and  must  of  necessity  be,  among  the  greatest  of  edu- 
cators. 

Horace  Greeley,  though  he  finally  yielded  support  to  the 
Whig  candidates  in  the  presidential  campaign  of  1848,  did 
much  efficient  service  against  party  thraldom.  He  performed 


"THE  NEW  DEPARTURE." 


295 


similar  service  in  1852,  though  again  supporting  the  regular 
nominations.  But  as  we  have  seen  he  spat  upon  the  platform 
and  upheld  one  of  his  own.  He  was  leading  the  people  on  the 
"new  departure;"  a  departure  which  eventually  led  to  the 
formation  of  the  political  organization  which  controlled  the 
affairs  of  the  nation  through  the  most  momentous  era  of  its 
history,  conferring  vast  and  lasting  benefits  upon  the  republic, 
but  at  length  undertaking  to  be  scarcely  less  arbitrary  in  its 
trammels  than  the  parties  which  it  had  displaced,  received,  as 
he  deemed  was  just,  his  hearty  and  eminent  opposition. 

But  between  the  time  when  the  Whig  party  was  dissolved 
and  that  when  the  Republican  party  was  organized,  grave 
questions  arose,  the  agitation  of  which  did  much  to  dismember 
the  Democracy,  and  prepare  the  way  for  a  new  and  better  era. 
Of  this  formative  period  of  the  new  era,  and  the  part  taken 
therein  by  Mr.  Greeley,  and  in  the  early  history  of  the  Rep»*bli- 
can  party,  I  shall  speak  in  the  next  chapter. 


HARRIET   CEECHER   STOWE.— See  page  293. 


CHAPTER   XVIII. 

1854  TO  18GO. 

Mr.  Greeley  in  the  Political  Contests  of  the  Time — The  Renewal  of 
Slavery  Agitation— The  Kansas-Nebraska  Struggle— Messrs.  Sumner, 
Chase,  Wade,  Seward,  Fcssenden  —  The  Know-Nothing  Party — Mr. 
Greeley  opposes  it— "The  Banks  Congress"  — Mr.  Greeley  Assaulted 
— General  Banks — Organization  of  the  Republican  Party — The  Fre- 
mont-Buchanan Campaign  —  Defeat  of  the  Republicans — The  Kansas 
War — "Lecompton"  —  Senator  Douglas  Defends  Popular  Sovereignty 
—  Senator  David  C.  Broderick,  of  California— Edward  D.  Baker— The 
Lincoln-Douglas  Debates— The  Tribune  on  the  Side  of  Douglas— Mr 
Greeley  Travels  Overland  to  California — Extracts  from  His  Letters — 
Buffaloes,  Prairie-Dogs,  and  Indians  — Life  at  Denver  in  1859  — Brig, 
ham  Young  and  Mormon  ism  —  Honours  in  California — Receptions  and 
Addresses— The  Yosemite— The  Pacific  Railroad  —  Return  —  John 
Brown. 

AFTER  the  dismemberment  of  the  Whig  party  came  chaos. 
The  dissolving  elements  at  first  settled  nowhere.  The  organ- 
ization was  for  a  time  maintained,  but  it  had  become  fossilized 
and  all  attempts  to  ressurect  it  and  breathe  therein  a  living 
soul  were  vain.  Its  mourners  went  about  the  streets  under- 
taking reconstruction;  but  the  silver  gray  cord  was  loosed,  the 
golden  bowl  was  broken.  The  day  of  small  things  had  not 
been  despised,  but  it  had  passed  away  forever.  Mr.  Greeley 
looked  on  all  attempts  to  revive  the  Whig  party  with  philo- 
sophical indifference",  and  upon  most  of  the  self-constituted 
architects  who  proposed  to  rebuild,  using  the  old  materials, 
with  good-natured  contempt.  It  was  not  long  until  Mr.  U. 
Gratz  Brown,  if  my  memory  is  not  at  fault,  very  correctly 
described  " an  old-line  Whig "  as  "a  very  respectable  gentle- 
man who  took  his  juleps  and  voted  the  Democratic  ticket 
regularly." 

During  this  chaotic  period  of  parties,  the  Temperance  reform 
was  forced  upon  the  people  as  a  political  question.  The  State 
of  Maine  led  off  with  what  was  called  a  Prohibitory  Liquor 


"SQUATTER  SOVEREIGNTY."  .  297 

Law, — an  enactment  utterly  prohibiting  the  sale  of  intoxica- 
ting liquors  as  a  beverage.  This  policy  was  adopted  in  other 
portions  of  the  country,  and  "the  Maine  law"  was  enacted  by 
a  number  of  States.  To  this  policy  Mr.  Greeley  gave  earnest 
adhesion,  and  continued  to  believe  in  its  wisdom  and  efficiency. 

In  some  portions  of  the  country  men  opposed  to  the  party 
in  power  attempted  to  unite  under  the  name  of  "Union  men;" 
in  other  sections  the  name  of  "People's  Party,"  was  adopted; 
in  others  still,  that  of  "  the  Fusion  Party."  After  a  while,  too, 
men  called  themselves  "anti-Nebraska  Whigs,"  others,  "anti- 
Nebraska  Democrats."  But  for  some  time  there  appeared  no 
common  bond  of  union,  and  to  the  casual  observer  the  Demo- 
cratic party  had  gained  an  indefinite  lease  of  power.  If  one 
had  observed  closely,  he  would  have  perceived  a  certain  coming 
danger  to  that  organization.  "Uncle  Tom"  had  created 
hundreds  of  thousands  of  friends  of  the  slave;  as  many  earnest 
enemies  of  the  system  of  slavery.  The  people  declined  to 
accept  the  Compromise  measure  as  a  finality.  They  insisted 
upon  their  right  to  discuss  the  slavery  question ;  and  they  did 
discuss  it  till  the  agitation  was  about  to  become  universal,  and 
an  anti-slavery  party  £t  once  formed,  when  events  occurred 
which  postponed  for  a  short  period  the  organization  of  such  a 
party.  , 

These  were  the  introduction  of  the  Kansas-Nebraska  bill  in 
Congress  by  Senator  Douglas^  and  the  rapid  spread  of  "  Know- 
nothingism"  about  the  same  time,  and,  to  a  great  extent,  in 
consequence  thereof.  The  Kansas-Nebraska  bill  dismembered 
the  Democratic  party.  Its  objectionable  provision  was  the 
repeal  of  the  Missouri  Compromise  of  1819-20.  In  lieu  of  that 
measure,  which  forbade  slavery  in  all  the  territories  of  the 
United  States  north  of  36  degrees  30  minutes,  the  bill  provided 
that  the  question  of  slavery  be  decided  by  the  people  of  the 
territories  themselves.  Ex-Senator  Benton,  of  Missouri,  declared 
with  coarse  vigour  that  in  making  this  provision,  Mr.  Douglas 
had  but  "  injected  a  stump  speech  into  the  belley  of  the  bill." 
What  the  author  of  the  measure  called  the  principle  of  popular 
sovereignty  was  in  ridicule  called  "  squatter  sovereignty  "  by 
those  who  opposed  it.  They  charged  that  it  was  a  reopening 


298  UFE  OF  HORACE  GKEELET. 

of  the  slavery  question;  that  it  was  a  deliberate  attempt  of 
the  Slave  Power,  to  desecrate  to  slavery  an  immense  domain 
which  by  the  solemn  faith  of  the  nation  had  been  consecrated 
to  freedom. 

The  bill  was  instantly  attacked  in  the  Senate  and  by  the 
public  journals  of  widest  influence,  whether  of  one  party  or 
another,  and  the  people  soon  became  greatly  agitated.  The 
North  was  fairly  aroused  to  wrath  against  the  bill,  in  every 
part  of  which  indignation  meetings  were  held,  Democrats  as 
well  as  others  taking  part  in  the  proceedings.  Eminent 
statesmen  in  the  Senate  took  every  advantage  of  the  popular 
excitement,  and  gave  powerful  impulse  to  the  rapidly-growing 
anti-slavery  sentiment  of  the  country.  Charles  Sumner,  of 
Massachusetts,  was  at  this  time  a  comparatively  new  member 
of  the  Senate.  He  has  since  done  more  than  any  of  his  co tem- 
poraries to  increase  the  renown  of  American  statesmanship, 
give  dignity,  power, beneficence  to  eloquence,  and  to  make  all 
men  bow  with  willing  and  respectful  deference  before  great 
genius  and  vast  learning;  but,  perhaps,  he  never  more  ably 
and  earnestly  served  his  countrymen  than  during  the  long, 
fierce  contest  over  the  Nebraska  bill.  The  State  of  Ohio  was 
then  represented  in  the  Senate  by  Salmon  P.  Chase  and  Benja- 
min F.  Wade.  The  former  afterwards  became  Secretary  of  the 
Treasury,  and  then  Chief  Justice  of  the  United  States.  To 
conduct  the  financial  affairs  of  the  republic  during  the  period 
Mr.  Chase  was  Secretary  was  a  task  of  incomparable  difficulty; 
but  Mr.  Chase  performed  it  with  incomparable  success.  Yet 
it  may  be  said  that  even  this  grand  achievement  of  adminis- 
trative ability  was  not  greater  than  the  forensic  talents  he 
displayed  in  the  Senate  during  the  Nebraska  struggle.  His 
colleague,  "Bluff  Ben.  Wade,"  or  "  Old  Ben.  Wade,"  as  he  was 
familiarly  called  by  people  and  press,  rushed  into  the  conflict 
with  his  accustomed  abandon,  and  dashingly  drove  the  enemy 
into  confusion.  Senator  Seward's  sublime  serenity  and  sublime 
courage,  his  chivalric  bearing,  and  his  tremendous  strength  of 
statement  were  never  more  superbly  manifested.  He  undoubt- 
edly saw  the  present  defeat  and  the  future  victory  of  freedom 
with  equal  clearness.  Senator  Fessenden,  of  Maine,  who  alone 


THE   KNOW-NOTinNO   PARTY.  299 

could  cope  with  Mr.  Douglas  in  readiness  and  strength  of 
argument  in  a  running  debate,  and  who  surpassed  the  great 
Illinoisan  in  culture  and  in  the  use  of  wit  and  humour,  gave 
zest,  liveliness,  piquancy  to  a  discussion  to  which  the  whole 
country  listened  with  eager  interest. 

The  press  gave  to  the  exciting  question  fullness  and  inde- 
pendence of  treatment  which,  perhaps,  no  question  of  politics 
had  previously  received.  All  the  Northern  States  which  had 
general  elections  in  1854,  voted  anti-Nebraska.  Illinois 
received  Mr.  Douglas,  when  he  went  home  to  spend  the  recess, 
with  indignation.  And  though  it  is  due  to  him  to  say  that  he 
was  not  at  all  alarmed,  he  keenly  felt  the  loss  which  he  had 
himself  given  to  his  great  popularity.  Mr.  Greeley  at  this 
time  thought  that  Mr.  Douglas  was  simply  bidding  for  the 
Presidency.  The  Tribune  assailed  him  with  great  energy  of 
expression,  and  did  more,  no  doubt,  to  give  him  the  temporary 
odium  which  attached  to  his  name  than  all  his  other  assailants. 

Now  was  the  time  for  the  formation  of  an  anti-slavery 
party.  It  happened,  however,  in  the  chaotic  state  of  affairs, 
that  a  prescriptive  organization  sprang  up  and  rapidly  over- 
ran the  country.  This 'was  the  Know-Nothing  party.  Based 
upon  religious  and  political  bigotry,  it  had  nothing  whatever 
to  commend  it  to  the  approval  of  liberal  and  intelligent  minds. 
Its  doctrines  were,  simply,  hatred  of  Roman  Catholics  and 
hatred  of  men  not  born  in  America.  A  political  creed  so  nar- 
row could,  under  ordinary  circumstances,  have  had  only  few 
adherents.  But  the  party  was  a  secret  society.  It  had  solemn 
oaths  to  administer  to  its  members,  pass-words,  grips,  etc.  As 
a  political  organization  it  was  fairly  entitled  to  unmixed  con- 
demnation, except  in  one  respect.  Its  discipline  was  excellent. 
And  there  was  no  political  discipline  extant  in  the  country 
except  in  the  Democratic  party  and  in  this.  Vast  numbers 
of  men,  therefore,  for  the  simple  purpose  of  organization, 
wrent  into  the  Know-Nothing  party  because  they  had  no  other 
party,  with  organization,  into  which  they  could  go,  save  only 
the  Democratic,  which  they  detested.  One  cannot  record  the 
fact  without  blushing  for  his  country,  but  it  is  probably  true 


300  LITE  OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

that  a  pluralty,  may  be  a  majority,  of  American  voters  joined 
this  Know-Nothing  party  in  1854  and  1855. 

Mr.  Greeley  fought  its  narrow  doctrines  and  its  secret  organ- 
ization from  the  beginning.  lie  disliked  Democracy,  as  repre- 
sented by  the  political  party  of  that  name,  much,  but  he 
disliked  political  bigotry  and  religious  intolerance  more.  In 
his  general  views  at  this  time,  both  Mr.  Seward  and  Mr.  "Weed 
undoubtedly  sympathized,  but  Mr.  Weed  was  willing  to  -do 
more  to  defeat  the  Democracy,  simply  for  what  he  esteemed 
the  good  of  defeating  that  party,  than  Mr.  Greeley.  Hence 
arose  suspicion  and  distrust  in  Mr.  Greeley 's  mind,  which 
culminated  in  the  noted  letter  dissolving  the  firm  of  "  Seward, 
Weed  &  Greeley,"  of  which  we  shall  have  occasion  to  speak 
more  at  length  by  and  by. 

The  elections  for  Representatives  in  Congress  in  the  year 
1854:  were  disastrous  to  the  Democratic  party,  but  did  not 
result  in  the  selection  of  a  majority  of  members  belonging  to 
any  one  party.  The  consequence  was  the  famous  contest  in 
the  House  which  continued  some  two  months,  and  finally 
resulted  in  the  election  of  Nathaniel  P.  Banks,  of  Massachu- 
setts, as  Speaker,  through  the  operation  of  the  plurality  rule. 
Mr.  Greeley,  having  returned  froni  Europe,  proceeded  to 
Washington  some  time  before  the  meeting  of  Congress,  and 
by  telegraph  and  letter  posted  The  Tribune  daily  with  intelli- 
gence from  the  scene  of  general  interest.  This  struggle  for  the 
organization  of  the  House,  so  long,  bitter,  and  exciting,  was 
participated  in  throughout  by  Mr.  Greeley,  who  constantly 
advised  with  members.  He  was  willing  that  the  free-soil 
members  should  support  an  anti-Nebraska  "American";  but 
the  "Americans"  from  the  South  refused  to  sustain  any  one 
of  "Republican"  principles,  the  free-soilers  now  beginning  to 
be  known  as  Republicans,  and,  quite  generally,  with  the  prefix 
"Black."  Wherefore,  Mr.  Greeley  determined  that  he  for  one 
would  fight  it  out  on  the  Republican  line.  "Stick  to  Banks  " 
became  his  motto,  because  Mr.  Banks  represented  the  Repub- 
lican idea,  and  from  this  judgment  he  never  for  a  moment 
swerved. 

The  caucus  candidate  of  the  Democrats  was  Mr.  William  A. 


THE  THIRTY-FOURTH   CONGRESS.  301 

Richardson,  of  Illinois,  a  devoted  friend  of  Judge  Douglas,  a 
shrewd  politician,  a  popular  stump-orator,  and  the  only  gentle- 
man of  the  House,  perhaps,  who  could  chew  tobacco  like  a 
saw-mill.  The  opposing  parties  made  no  caucus  nominations. 
The  Southern  "Americans"  supported  Humphrey  Marshall,  of 
Kentucky,  but  Henry  M.  Fuller,  of  Pennsylvania,  received  a 
number  of  votes  from  this  source.  Mr.  Banks  received  a  larger 
number  of  votes  than  any  ol  Mr.  Richardson's  competitors,  on 
the  first  ballot,  except  Mr.  Marshall  and  Mr.  L.  D.  Campbell, 
of  Ohio.  Mr.  Campbell  was  at  this  time  in  the  prime  of  man- 
hood, and  had  probably  been  defeated  for  Congress  more 
frequently  than  any  of  his  co-members.  Small  in  stature,  he 
was  known  in  Ohio  as  "  the  Butler  Pony."  A  strong  speaker, 
long  a  Whig  of  decidedly  free-soil  proclivities,  he  had  passed 
into  the  "  American  "  party  in  the  general  pressure  in  that 
direction.  That  he  was  an  able  debater  is  shown  by  the  fact 
that  he  often  met  the  celebrated  Alexander  H.  Stephens,  of 
Georgia,  and  beat  him  in  argument.  Mr.  Campbell  was 
elected  to  Congress  as  a  Democrat  in  1870 — beating  Robert 
C.  Schenck  —  but  by  this  time  age  and  ill  health  had  under- 
mined his  energies,  and 'he  manifested  in  the  House  none  of 
his  old  lire  and  power.  His  highest  vote  for  Speaker  of  the 
XXXI Vth  Congress  —  known  as  "the  Banks  Congress"  — 
was  81  votes.  At  length  he  refused  to  permit  the  use  of  his 
name,  from  which  time  Mr.  Banks  steadily  increased  in 
strength,  until  his  election  on  the  133d  ballot,  he  receiving 
103  votes;  William  Aiken,  of  South  Carolina,  100;  Mr. 
Fuller,  6;  all  others  5. 

The  National  Capital  has  not  often  been  in  a  higher  state 
of  excitement  than  it  was  throughout  this  long  contest.  And 
the  country  fully  sympathised  with  the  political  metropolis. 
Horace  Greeley  was  thoroughly  aroused.  He  thundered  in 
The  Tribune  as  he  seldom  thundered  before  or  afterwards.  He 
was  thus  "  terribly  in  earnest "  because  he  believed  the  election 
of  Mr.  Banks  would  greatly  aid  in  the  successful  organization 
of  the  Republican  party,  and  the  speedy  extinguishment  of 
Know-Nothingism. 

All  sorts  of  stratagems,  disreputable  and  otherwise,  were 


302  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

resorted  to  with  the  object  of  defeating  Mr.  Banks.  Mr 
Albert  Rust,  of  Arkansas,  on  the  21st  of  January,  1856, 
offered  a  long  preamble  and  resolution  the  upshot  of  which 
was  that  Mr.  Banks  must  be  withdrawn  as  a  candidate!  Other 
candidates  were  named,  of  course,  but  Mr.  Banks  was  the  man 
Mr.  Rust's  party  proposed  to  drive  off  the  track.  Mr.  Greelcy 
spoke  of  this  shameful  manosuvre  in  as  energetic  Anglo-Saxon 
as  he  knew  how  to  use,  and  he  was  long  distinguished  in  that 
regard.  There  was  nothing  coarse  in  his  criticism  upon  Rust's 
resolution.  Its  truthfulness  and  keenness  cut  that  member 
very  deeply,  however,  and  he  responded  in  the  then  fashion- 
able Southern  manner,  namely,  with  fist  and  bludgeon,  pistols 
and  knives  in  reserve.  Mr.  Greeley  gave  a  full  account  of  the 
affair  in  The  Tribune  of  January  26th: 

"I  have  heard  since  I  came  here  a  good  deal  of  the  personal  violence  to 
which  I  was  exposed,  but  only  one  man  has  offered  to  attack  me  until  to- 
day, and  he  was  so  drunk  that  he  made  a  poor  fist  of  it.  In  fact,  I  do  not 
remember  that  any  man  ever  seriously  attacked  me  till  now. 

"I  was  conversing  with  two  gentlemen  on  my  way  down  from  the 
Capitol,  after  the  adjournment  of  the  House  this  afternoon,  when  a  stranger 
requested  a  word  with  me.  I  stopped,  and  my  friends  went  on.  The 
stranger,  who  appeared  in  the  prime  of  life,  six  feet  high,  and  who  must 
weigh  over  two  hundred,  thus  begun : — 

" '  Is  your  name  Greeley  ?' 

" '  Yes.' 

" '  Are  you  a  non-combatant  ?' 

"  '  That  is  according  to  circumstances.' 

"  The  words  were  hardly  out  of  my  mouth  when  he  struck  me  a  stun- 
ning blow  on  the  right  side  of  my  head,  and  followed  it  by  two  or  three 
more,  as  rapidly  as  possible.  My  hands  were  still  in  my  great-coat  pockets, 
for  I  had  no  idea  that  he  was  about  to  strike.  He  staggered  me  against 
the  fence  of  the  walk  from  the  Capitol  to  the  Avenue,  but  did  not  get  me 
down.  I  rallied  as  soon  as  possible,  and  saw  him  standing  several  feet 
from  me,  with  several  persons  standing  or  rushing  in  between  us.  I 
asked,  'Who  is  this  man!  I  don't  know  him,'  and  understood  him  to 
answer,  with  an  imprecation,  '  You  '11  know  me  soon  enough,'  or  '  You  '11 
know  me  hereafter,'  when  he  turned  and  went  down  toward  the  street. 
No  one  answered  niy  inquiry  directly,  but  some  friends  soon  came  up, 
who  told  me  that  my  assailant  was  Albert  Rust,  M.  C.  from  Arkansas.  He 
gave  no  hint  of  any  cause  or  pretext  lie  may  have  had  for  this  assault,  but 
I  must  infer  that  it  is  to  be  found  in  my  strictures  in  Monday's  Tribune 
(letter  of  Thursday  evening  last)  on  his  attempt  to  drive  Mr.  Banks  out  of 
the  field  as  a  candidate  for  Speaker,  by  passing  a  resolution  inviting  all 


N.    P.    BANKS.  303 

the  present  candidates  to  withdraw.  I  thought  that  a  mean  trick,  and 
said  so  most  decidedly;  I  certainly  think  no  better  of  it,  now  that  I  have 
made  the  acquaintance  of  its  author. 

"The  bully  turned  and  walked  down  alone;  I  followed,  conversing  with 
two  friends.  Crossing  Four-and-a-half  street,  they  dropped  behind  to 
speak  to  acquaintances,  and  I,  walking  along  toward  the  National  Hotel, 
soon  found  myself  in  the  midst  of  a  huddle  of  strangers.  One  of  these 
turned  short  upon  me — I  saw  it  was  my  former  assailant — and  said,  '  Do 
you  know  me  now  ?'  I  answered, '  Yes ;  you  are  Rust  of  Arkansas.'  He 
said  something  of  what  he  would  do  if  I  were  a  combatant,  and  I  replied 
that  I  claimed  no  exemption  on  that  account.  He  now  drew  a  heavy  cane, 
which  I  had  not  seen  before,  and  struck  a  pretty  heavy  blow  at  my  head, 
which  I  caught  on  my  left  arm,  with  no  other  damage  than  a  rather  severe 
bruise.  He  was  trying  to  strike  again,  and  I  was  endeavouring  to  close 
with  him,  when  several  persons  rushed  between  and  separated  us.  I  did 
not  strike  him  at  all,  nor  lay  a  finger  on  him ;  but  it  certainly  would  have 
been  a  pleasure  to  me,  had  I  been  able  to  perform  the  public  duty  of 
knocking  him  down.  I  cannot  mistake  the  movement  of  his  hand  on  the 
Avenue,  and  am  sure  it  must  have  been  toward  a  pistol  in  his  belt.  And 
the  crowd  which  surrounded  us  was  nearly  all  Southern,  as  he  doubtless 
knew  before  he  renewed  his  attack  on  me.  *  *  *  * 

"  I  presume  this  is  not  the  last  outrage  to  which  I  am  to  be  subjected.  I 
came  here  with  a  clear  understanding  that  it  was  about  an  even  chance 
whether  I  should  or  should  not  be  allowed  to  go  home  alive ;  for  my  busi- 
ness here  is  to  unmask  hypocrisy,  defeat  treachery,  and  rebuke  meanness, 
and  these  are  not  dainty  employments  even  in  smoother  times  than  ours. 
But  I  shall  stay  here  just  so  long  as  I  think  proper,  using  great  plainness 
of  speech,  but  endeavouring  to  treat  all  men  justly  and  faithfully.  I  may 
often  judge  harshly,  and  even  be  mistaken  as  to  facts,  but  I  shall  always 
be  ready  to  correct  my  mistakes  and  to  amend  my  judgments.  I  shall 
carry  no  weapons  and  engage  in  no  brawls ;  but  if  ruffians  waylay  and 
assail  me,  I  shall  certainly  not  run,  and,  so  far  as  able,  I  shall  defend 
myself." 

Mr.  Greeley  declined  to  prosecute  Rust  for  the  assault.  The 
respectable  press  of  the  country  expressed  disapprobation  of 
Rust's  ruffianism,  one  journal  saying  that  "  the  fellow  who 
would  strike  Horace  Greeley  would  strike  his  mother." 

Writing  of  this  long  contest  for  the  organization  of  the 
House  years  afterwards, — in  his  Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life, — 
Mr.  Greeley  speaks  of  the  successful  man  as  follows : 

Mr.  Banks,  though  then  in  his  second  term,  proved  an  excellent 
Speaker,  —  prompt,  vigorous,  decided,  and  just.  Though  a  majority 
remained  politically  hostile  to  him,  and  the  waves  of  party  passion  ran 
very  high,  I  believe  but  one  of  the  many  decisions  made  by  him  as  Speaker 


304  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

was  overruled;  and  the  House,  on  calmer  consideration,  reconsidered  its 
overruling  vote.  Abler  men  may  have  filled  that  difficult  post;  but  no 
man,  I  judge,  ever  gave  himself  more  unreservedly  to  the  discharge  of  its 
arduous  duties.  I  have  heard  that  Mr.  Banks  was  a  schoolmaster  in  his 
youth,  and  his  manner  in  the  chuir  often  countenanced  the  tradition.  If 
he  had  a  fault,  it  was  that  of  overdoing,  impelled  by  absorbing  anxiety  to 
keep  in  order  a  body  essentially  turbulent,  and  inclined  to  resent  and 
baffle  any  attempt  to  draw  the  reins  too  tightly."  The  temptations  to  an 
opposite  course  are  very  strong,  and  presiding  officers  far  oftener  err  on 
the  side  of  laxity  than  on  that  of  rigour. 

Though  Mr.  Banks  was  never  surpassed,  perhaps,  as  presiding 
officer  of  the  House,  the  praise  is  of  no  great  value.  The  quali- 
ties of  an  auctioneer  rather  than  others  are  there  most  called 
into  exercise.  In  after  years  he  became  the  most  influential 
man  on  the  floor,  and  the  only  member  of  the  XLIId  Con- 
gress— 1871-'73 — who  always  received  universal  attention  the 
moment  he  pronounced  "  Mr.  Speaker."  Of  that  Congress  he 
was  by  far  the  greatest  orator,  and  was  second  to  none  in  gen- 
eral influence.  His  retirement  at  its  close  may  justly  bo 
regarded  as  a  public  calamity. 

As  Mr.  Greeley  had  foreseen,  the  blunder  of  Know-Nothing 
ism  postponed  the  organization  of  a  political  party  with  an 
anti-slavery  creed.  It  was  impossible,  however,  long  to  pre- 
vent the  people  from  finding  the  position  in  which  they  of 
right  should  be  placed.  Whether  previously  of  one  party  or 
another,  they  had  gravitated  toward  anti-slavery  since  the 
Compromise  of  1850.  Mrs.  Stowe's  popular  novel  greatly 
increased  the  movement.  The  Kansas-Nebraska  bill,  manifest- 
ing a  design  to  extend  the  domain  of  the  slave  power,  added^ 
new  impetus.  The  Know-Nothing  party  checked  the  move- 
ment, but  it  was  impossible  to  stay  its  progress.  It  cannot  be 
justly  claimed  that  statesmen  or  journalists  had  most  to  do 
•with  the  formation  of  the  Republican  party.  It  was  the 
spontaneous  movement  of  the  people  against  a  threatened 
danger.  Statesmen  and  journalists  who  had  been  eminent  in 
the  Democratic  party  and  those  who  had  been  eminent  in  the 
Whig  party  sympathized  alike  with  the  political  revolution. 
Mr.  Fessenden,  of  Maine,  though  a  Whig,  became  no  more 
sincere  Republican  than  Mr.  Hamlin,  a  Democrat.  Mr.  Seward, 


THE  REPUBLICAN   PARTY.  305 

a  Whig,  was  no  more  earnest  in  the  new  party  than  Mr.  Pres- 
ton King,  a  Democrat, — a  man,  let  it  be  said  in  passing,  of 
solid  understanding,  like  his  physical  structure,  and  of  dis- 
positions so  amiable  that  his  personal  influence  in  the  Senate 
and  the  government  has  rarely  been  equalled.  Henry  S. 
Lane,  of  Indiana,  was  not  earlier  to  adopt  the  faith  of  Repub- 
licanism, than  Oliver  P.  Morton.  In  Illinois,  Trumbull  and 
Lincoln  clasped  hands,  and  Ray  andWentworthand  Judd  and 
many  others  who  had  been  influential  Democrats  bade  "  the 
Little  Giant"  a  long  farewell.  Mr.  Greeley  and  Mr.  Bryant 
never  could  forget  the  fierce  conflicts  of  the  past,  but  against 
the  common  danger  they  stood  shoulder  to  shoulder  for  years, 
and  though  ever  in  debate  upon  minor  issues,  made  common 
warfare  against  the  aggressive  enemy  of  the  republic. 

Of  such  elements,  hitherto  discordant,  was  the  Republican 
party  formed.  It  had  one  idea.  This  was  enough;  and  pre- 
cisely one  more  than  any  other  party  had.  That  idea  was  The 
Restriction  of  Slavery.  By  it  were  embraced  National  Faith, 
Political  Morality,  Progress,  Reform.  It  was,  therefore,  both 
a  broad  and  an  elevated  creed.  In  its  logical  development  it 
was  sure  to  become  Abolition  of  Slavery,  and  national  salva- 
tion. The  people  saw  this  very  clearly.  Few  public  men  saw 
it  more  clearly  than  Horace  Greeley.  Nowhere  else  were  the 
wrongs  of  slavery  more  abundantly,  clearly,  and  constantly 
shown  than  in  The  Tribune.  Upon  such  topics  Mr.  Greeley 
wrote  what  would  make  many  volumes,  if  printed  in  books. 
And  it  was  upon  such  themes  that  Mr.  Congdon,  an  associate 
editor,  wrote  a  series  of  articles  continuing  through  several 
years,  which  were  the  best  exhibitions  of  humourous  satire  yet 
shown  by  an  American  writer,  writing  in  the  English  lan- 
guage. 

The  first  general  campaign  into  which  the  people  led  the 
leaders  of  the  Republican  party  resulted  in  a  defeat.  This  was 
in  the  year  1856.  The  first  national  convention  of  the  year 
was  that  of  the  "  American  "  party,  being  the  debris  of  the 
Know-Nothing  organization,  which  had  passed  into  a  state  of 
ruin.  Millard  Fillmore  was  nominated  for  President,  and 
Andrew  J.  Donelson,  of  Tennessee,  for  Vice-President.  This 
20 


306  LIFE   r>7   HORACE   GREELEY. 

ticket  was  afterv-  ^s  (September)  endorsed  by  an  assemblage 
of  amiable  r^ntlemen  who  called  themselves  a  Whig  National 
Convention,  over  which  Mr.  Edward  Bates,  of  Missouri,  pre- 
sided. Having  endorsed  the  "American"  ticket,  and  called 
up  the  ghosts  of  dead  patriots  to  shake  their  gory  locks  at 
"  sectional "  parties,  the  amiable  gentlemen  departed  about  their 
business,  and  as  "WTiigs  appeared  again  nevermore.  But  before 
this  the  Democratic  convention  had  assembled  at  Cincinnati, 
and  nominated  James  Buchanan,  of  Pennsylvania,  and  John  C. 
Breckinridge,  of  Kentucky,  for  President  and  Vice-President 
respectively.  The  competitors  of  Mr.  Buchanan  were  Mr. 
Douglas,  of  Illinois,  President  Pierce,  and  General  Cass.  The 
contest  was  very  animated,  but  resulted  in  the  choice  of  the 
least  worthy  of  the  candidates,  and  the  ill  disguised  wrath  of 
many  of  the  best  men  of  the  party.  It  was  known  to  them 
that  Mr.  Douglas  would  at  least  give  fair  play  to  freedom  in 
the  territories,  and  that  Mr.  Buchanan  would  not.  The  candid 
will  agree  that  the  juggling  platform  gave  him  who  was 
elected  much  excuse  for  his  betrayal  of  free  Kansas  after  he 
became  President,  —  a  betrayal  which  might  have  succeeded  at 
once  in  producing  untold  ills  but  for  the  brave  and  patriotic 
course  of  fcenator  Douglas. 

The  Republicans  met  in  their  first  national  convention  at 
the  city  of  Philadelphia  on  the  17th  of  June.  Henry  S.  Lane, 
of  Indiana,  presided.  Upon  taking  the  chair,  he  delivered  a 
speech  of  stirring  eloquence,  which  fairly  electrified  the  vast 
audience,  and  succeeded  in  giving  that  gentleman  high  reputa- 
tion as  an  orator  throughout  the  country.  Many  of  the 
delegates  were  favourable  to  the  nomination  of  Judge  McLean, 
of  Ohio.  He  had  for  many  years  been  a  Justice  of  the  Supreme 
Court  of  the  United  States,  where  he  had  shown  great  dignity, 
learning,  and  ability.  Others  preferred  a  younger  man,  and 
among  these  was  Mr.  Greeley.  These  united  upon  Colonel 
John  C.  Fremont,  of  California,  whose  adventurous,  dashing 
career  had  given  him  great  popularity.  Mr.  Greeley  correctly 
thought  Fremont  would  be  especially  strong  with  young  men, 
who  formed  a  very  large  proportion  of  the  new  party.  These 
views  prevailed,  and  Fremont  was  chosen  on  the  first  ballot 


THE   FREMONT  CAMPAIGN.  307 

Associated  with  him  as  candidate  for  Yice-President  was 
William  L.  Dayton,  of  New  Jersey,  whose  strongest  compet- 
itor for  this  position  was  Abraham  Lincoln,  ol  Illinois,  then 
but  very  little  known  except  in  the  West. 

The  campaign  was  one  of  excited  interest  throughout,  but 
resulted  in  the  election  of  Buchanan  and  Breckinridge  by  a 
large  majority  of  electoral  votes  and  a  considerable  plurality  of 
the  popular  vote.  Nevertheless,  the  Republican  candidates  had 
an  immense  majority  in  the  Free  States,  and  an  aggregate  pop- 
ular strength  of  1,341,514  votes. 

Mr.  Greeley  threw  his  whole  soul  into  this  campaign.  Other 
matters  were  treated  in  the  platform  but  the  issue  joined  was 
that  of  Slavery.  Civil  war  was  practically  raging  in  the  Ter- 
ritory of  Kansas.  The  aggressions  of  the  Slave  Power  were 
there  so  unmistakably  and  wickedly  shown  that  no  man  could 
deny  the  fact.  Citizens  of  the  border  counties  of  Missouri 
invaded  the  Territory  in  behalf  of  Slavery.  In  the  vigorous 
language  of  the  times  they  were  called  "  Border  Humans." 
Associations  were  formed  in  the  Free  States  with  the  object  of 
colonizing  the  Territory  in  the  interest  of  Freedom.  These, 
by  the  advice  of  the  Rev.  Henry  Ward  Beecher  himself,  and 
others  of  scarcely  less  pacific  principles  in  general,  were  hand- 
somely supplied  with  Sharpe's  rifles.  The  war  in  bleeding 
Kansas  went  bravely  on,  supplying  the  friends  of  j  ustice  with 
many  unanswerable  arguments  and  irresistible  appeals.  The 
Tribune,  which  ever  fought  a  magnificent  fight  when  it  had 
once  entered  upon  an  active  canvass,  never  more  gallantly 
engaged  the  enemy  than  during  the  Fr6mont-Buchanan  cam- 
paign. During  most  of  the  canvass  it  had  a  powerful  ally  in 
The  Herald,  whose  editor  and  Mr.  Greeley  laid  aside  their  long 
personal  discussions,  and  met  in  friendly  recognition.1  The 
final  defeat  was  not  unexpected  by  Mr.  Greeley;  and,  though 
he  greatly  lamented  it,  he  thought  he  saw  in  the  result  auguries 

1  Henry  S.  Lane  said  in  some  of  his  speeches  during  this  campaign 
something  like  this :  "  You  all  know,  my  countrymen,  there  are  three 
things  that  a  candidate  for  President  must  have,  in  order  to  be  elected ; 
and  Fremont  has  them  all  —  the  women  (God  bless  them !),  the  young  men, 
and  the  New- York  Herald !" 


808  LITE  OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

of  coming  triumph.     "  Americanism  "  certainly  had  received 
mortal  wounds;  many  of  the  States  were  strongly  Republican ; 
the  Senate  of  the  United  States  was  certain  to  become  anti 
slavery. 

But  even  if  Mr.  Greeley  had  not  seen  cause  of  much  gratu- 
lation  in  the  positive  strength  of  the  Republicans,  he  had 
grounds  of  hope  in  the  dissensions,  sure  to  come,  of  the  Dem- 
ocratic party.  It  was  certain  that  either  the  South  or  the 
North  had  been  deceived  by  the  Cincinnati  platform.  In  the 
North,  " popular  sovereignty"  was  part  of  Democracy,  pro- 
claimed by  every  orator.  In  the  South,  popular  sovereignty 
was  derided.  Whether  President  Buchanan  should  take  one 
position  or  the  other  a  dismemberment  of  the  Democracy  was 
inevitable.  Thus  the  first  notable  result  of  the  Kansas- 
Nebraska  bill  was  the  formation  of  a  powerful  anti-slavery 
party.  The  next  notable  result  of  that  measure  was  the  dis- 
memberment of  the  Democratic  party,  whereby  the  Eepublicans 
were  in  due  time  able  to  achieve  a  great,  momentous  victory. 

The  first  instance  of  rupture  grew  out  of  the  attempt  to 
fasten  slavery  upon  the  people  of  Kansas  through  a  fraudulent 
State  Constitution,  called  the  Lecompton  Constitution,  from  the 
place  where  it  was  concocted.  This  pretended  fundamental 
law  was  passed  by  a  body  of  men  elected  by  means  which 
would  have  rendered  the  whole  affair  the  most  laughable  and 
grotesque  of  burlesques  but  for  its  wicked  purpose.  Ballot- 
boxes  were  stuffed  with  ballots  voted  by  the  batch  in  the 
names  of  persons  recorded  on  obsolete  directories  of  eastern 
cities.  "  Lecompton  "  might  possibly  have  been  the  will  of 
some  of  the  citizens,  dead  and  alive,  of  the  city  of  Cincinnati ; 
by  no  possibility  could  it  have  been  pronounced  the  will  of 
the  people  of  Kansas.  Nevertheless,  in  the  interests  of  the 
Slave  Power,  President  Buchanan  sustained  it.  In  view  of  the 
popular  feeling  against  it,  he  at  first  demurred,  and,  as  stated 
by  Mr.  Greeley,  it  was  currently  reported  that  his  less  scrupu- 
lous Secretary  of  the  Treasury, — Ilowell  Cobb,  of  Georgia, — 
being  asked  by  a  visitor  what  was  the  matter,  carelessly  replied, 
"O,  not  much;  only  Old  Buck  is  opposing  the  administration." 
But  he  speedily  gave  in  his  adhesion. 


SENATOR   BRODERICK.  309 

Senator  Douglas  openly  declared  in  favour  of  popular  sover- 
eignty. He  opposed  "Lecompton"  in  the  Senate  with  that 
persistent  pluck  for  which  he  was  more  remarkable  than  any 
other  of  his  cotemporary  statesmen.  He  was  removed  from 
the  position  he  had  long  held, — Chairman  of  the  Committee 
on  Territories, — and  his  influence  with  the  administration  was 
destroyed.  Nevertheless  he  kept  up  the  fight  with  most 
admirable  gallantry  and  with  increasing  earnestness,  richly 
earning  the  approbation  of  his  countrymen  and  receiving  the 
hearty  plaudits  of  the  Republicans. 

Among  eminent  men  of  the  Democratic  party  who  sustained 
Mr.  Douglas,  was  Senator  David  C.  Broderick,  of  California. 
Mr.  Broderick  had  risen  from  an  humble  position  in  life.  He 
spent  his  youth  and  early  manhood  in  the  city  of  New-York, 
where  his  natural  talents  and  courageous  spirit  gave  him  large 
influence.  Removing  to  California  not  long  after  the  war  with 
Mexico,  he  became  a  prominent  politician  in  the  new  State, 
and  rapidly  grew  in  intellectual  and  moral  stature.  He  was 
elected  to  the  United  States  Senate  in  1856,  and  there  his  com- 
manding presence,  chivalric  bearing,  and  brilliant  parts  as  a 
debater  at  once  gave  him  prominence  and  influence.  Unless  it 
were  by  the  ruffianly  assault  upon  Senator  Sumner,  in  1856,  by 
a  Representative  from  South  Carolina,  the  utter  barbarism  of 
the  Slave  Power  was  not  more  conspicuously  illustrated  than 
in  the  case  of  the  accomplished  and  generous  Broderick.  The 
Slave  Power  doomed  him  to  destruction,  and  he  fell  in  a  duel 
in  September,  1859,  slain  by  the  Chief  Justice  of  the  State 
which  this  victim  of  a  horrible  custom  had  done  so  much  to 
honour.  The  death  of  Mr.  Broderick  gave  occasion  to  one  of 
the  noblest  exhibitions  of  American  eloquence,  in  the  appreci 
ative,  majestic,  and  profoundly  pathetic  funeral  oration  by 
Edward  D.  Baker,  afterwards  United  States  Senator,  a  Brigadier- 
General  of  the  Union  army,  who  met  his  death  in  battle,  gal- 
lantly contending  against  the  same  power  at  whose  command 
Broderick  himself  had  fallen. 

No  Republican  looked  upon  the  contest  waged  against 
"  Lecompton  "  by  Senator  Douglas  and  his  sympathizers  in  the 
Democratic  party  with  more  unmingled  satisfaction  than 


310  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GKEELEY. 

Horace  Greeley.  Former  severe  criticisms,  just  though  they 
were  supposed  to  be,  were  forgotteu ;  mere  partizan  ties  were 
entirely  unloosed ;  and  the  Great  Editor  came  out  in  fervent 
approval  of  the  Great  Debater.  The  journalist  afterwards 
expressed  his  deliberate  judgment  of  the  statesman  in  these 
words : 

"  Mr.  Douglas  was  the  readiest  man  I  ever  knew.  He  was  not  a  hard 
student;  if  he  had  been,  it  would  have  been  difficult  to  set  limits  to  his 
power.  I  have  seen  him  rise  in  the  Senate  quite  at  fault  with  regard  to 
essential  facts  in  controversy,  and  thence  make  damaging  blunders  in 
debate;  but  he  readily  caught  at  and  profited  by  any  suggestion  thrown 
out  by  friend  or  foe;  and  no  American  ever  excelled  him  in  olr-hand  dis- 
cussion :  so  that,  even  if  worsted  in  the  first  stages,  he  was  apt  to  regain 
his  lost  ground  as  he  went  on.  Once,  as  I  sat  with  the  senior  Francis  P. 
Blair  and  one  or  two  others  outside  the  bar  of  the  Senate  in  1856,  he  made 
us  the  text  of  an  amusing  dissertation  on  the  piebald,  ring-streaked,  and 
speckled  materials  whereof  the  new  Republican  party  was  composed; 
and,  passing  us  soon  afterward,  he  hailed  me  familiarly  with  the  interro- 
gation, 'Didn't  I  give  you  a  good  turn  just  now?'  At  a  later  day,  when 
the  Lecompton  struggle  was  in  progress,  a  mutual  friend,  remembering 
that  my  strictures  on  Mr.  Douglas  in  former  years  had  been  of  a  very 
caustic  sort,  inquired  of  him  whether  he  had  any  objections,  on  account 
of  those  strictures,  to  meeting  me  on  a  friendly  footing.  'Certainly  not,' 
was  his  instant  response;  'I  always  pay  that  class  of  debts  as  I  go  along.' 
Our  country  has  often  been  called  to  mourn  severe,  untimely  losses ;  yet  I 
deem  the  death  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  just  at  the  outbreak  of  our  great 
Civil  War,  and  when  he  had  thrown  his  whole  soul  into  the  cause  of  the 
country,  one  of  the  most  grievous  and  irreparable."  * 

The  Eepublicans  of  the  State  of  Illinois,  though  cordially 
approving  the  course  of  Senator  Douglas,  most  emphatically 
non-concurred  in  the  suggestion  that  he  should  be  returned  to 
the  Senate,  —  a  suggestion  which  Mr.  Greeley  deemed  sensible 
and  wise  at  the  time,  and  never  changed  his  opinion  in  that 
regard.  So  much  opposed,  indeed,  were  the  Illinois  Repub- 
licans to  continuing  Mr.  Douglas  in  the  Senate,  that  they  made 
a  contest  against  him  unusual  in  form,  unparalleled  in  earnest- 
ness, and  unapproached  in  the  forensic  ability  and  universal 
interest  which  it  produced  by  any  similar  contest  in  the  history 
of  American  politics. 

The  Republican  convention  of  the  year  1858,  convened  at 

*  Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life,  pp.  358-59. 


LINCOLN   AND   DOUGLAS.  311 

Springfield  for  the  purpose  of  nominating  candidates  for  the 
various  State  olfices  to  be  filled  at  the  November  election,  not 
only  did  this,  but  nominated  Abraham  Lincoln  as  the  candi- 
date of  the  Republicans  for  United  States  Senator.  Upon  this 
occasion  Mr.  Lincoln  delivered  a  masterly,  memorable  speech, 
—  which  was  never  answered,  though  very  many  times  replied 
to,  —  beginning  with  the  forcible  illustration  from  Holy  Writ, 
that  a  house  divided  against  itself  cannot  stand.  Afterwards, 
he  and  Mr.  Douglas  met  in  joint  discussion  at  a  number  of 
cities  and  towns  in  different  parts  of  the  State,  and  were  list- 
ened to  with  lively  interest  by  hundreds  of  thousands  of  citi- 
zens in  the  aggregate.  The  debates  were  fully  reported  and 
published  the  morning  following  each  debate  in  The  Chicago 
Tribune  and  The  Times  of  that  city,  the  latter  of  which  was 
edited  at  this  time,  if  my  memory  does  not  err,  by  Mr.  James 
W.  Sheahan,  one  of  America's  ablest  journalists,  and  the  biog- 
rapher of  Mr.  Douglas.  The  Associated  Press  published 
lengthy  reports  of  the  discussions;  several  metropolitan  jour- 
nals had  special  reporters.  Thus  the  people  of  the  whole 
country  were  kept  fully  informed  of  all  the  sagacious  strata- 
gems, the  masterly  manoeuvres,  the  general  engagements  of 
this  intellectual  war  of  the  Illinois  giants.  The  eyes  of  the 
nation  looked  toward  Illinois;  the  ear  of  the  body  politic  was 
turned  in  that  direction,  intently  listening.  The  State  itself 
was  aglow  with  excitement,  the  like  of  which  was  never  seen 
even  in  the  most  animated  Presidential  campaign.  Popular 
sovereignity  could  not  have  been  more  forcibly  expounded 
than  it  was  by  Mr.  Douglas;  Republicanism  was  never  more 
eloquently,  wisely,  logically,  placed  before  the  public  mind 
than  in  the  speeches  of  Mr.  Lincoln,  who  now  and  here  attained 
a  reputation  for  thoughtfulness  and  statesmanship  which  after 
events  amply  demonstrated  that  he  deserved.  It  would  be 
difficult  to  say  which  of  the  great  disputants  exhibited  the 
greater  intellectual  power.  If  Mr.  Lincoln  were  superior  in 
comprehensiveness  of  view  and  statement;  if  his  patriotism 
appeared  to  be  of  a  nobler  type,  embracing  the  good  of  all 
men  in  its  beneficent  purpose;  yet  was  Mr.  Douglas  the  quicker 
in  reply  and  the  more  ready  to  demolish  an  unexpected  argn- 


312  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GKEELEY. 

ment.  If  Mr.  Lincoln  were  the  more  versatile  and  captivating 
in  illustration,  perhaps  Mr.  Douglas  was  closer  in  his  reason- 
ings. But  it  must  be  admitted  that  Mr.  Lincoln's  imperturbable 
good-nature  contrasted  pleasantly  against  the  occasional  out- 
bursts of  ill  temper  on  the  part  of  Mr.  Douglas. 

Singularly  enough,  the  result  was  a  victory  to  either;  for 
though  Mr.  Douglas  had  a  majority  of  the  members  of  the 
Legislature,  and  was  returned  to  the  Senate,  a  majority  of  the 
people  were  represented  by  the  friends  of  Mr.  Lincoln. 

No  one  was  more  profoundly  impressed  with  the  ability 
shown  by  Mr.  Lincoln  during  this  remarkable  canvass  than 
Horace  Greeley.  He  completely  sympathized  with  the  Repub- 
licans of  Illinois  in  their  love  and  admiration  of  their  chosen 
leader,  but  doubted  the  political  wisdom  of  their  course.  He 
says  it  was  long  before  they  forgave  him  for  this  difference  of 
judgment.  In  truth,  the  Republicans  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  State 
judged  the  somewhat  persistent  interference  of  The  New- 
York  Tribune  in  the  management  of  their  own  domestic 
politics  in  their  own  way,  subject  only  to  the  Constitution  of 
the  United  States,  as  a  trifle  impertinent.  It  is  due  to  Mr. 
Greeley's  position  to  say  that,  upon  the  whole,  he  preserved 
his  temper  much  better  than  they  did.  Political  events  which 
speedily  followed  erased  all  recollection  of  the  unpleasantness. 

In  the  summer  of  1859,  Mr.  Greeley  made  a  journey  over- 
land from  New- York  to  the  Pacific  coast.  A  railway  to  the 
Pacific  had  been  early  advocated  by  him  as  a  national  necessity 
alike  in  its  political  and  its  commercial  aspects.  While  others, 
he  says,  "were  scoffingly  likening  it  to  a  tunnel  under  the 
Atlantic  or  a  bridge  to  the  moon,  I  was  pondering  the  proba- 
bilities and  means  of  its  early  construction.  I  resolved  to 
make  a  journey  of  observation  across  the  continent,  with 
reference  to  the  natural  obstacles  presented  to,  and  facilities 
afforded  for,  its  construction."  He  left  home  on  the  9th  of 
May,  and  reached  New-York  on  his  return  near  the  close  of 
September,  —  a  period  of  his  busy  life  of  notable  interest,  and 
of  great  usefulness  to  his  country  then  and  afterwards. 

Proceeding  by  way  of  Cleveland,  Chicago,  Quincy,  Illinois, 
and  St.  Joseph,  Missouri,  by  rail,  he  went  thence  by  steamer 


GOOD-NIGHT  TO   CIVILIZATION.  313 

to  Atcliison,  Kansas.  He  made  quite  a  tonr  of  the  Territory 
and  delivered  therein  a  "number  of  political  addresses.  He 
observed  in  one  of  his  letters  that  "  the  twin  curses  of  Kansas, 
now  that  the  border-ruffians  have  stopped  ravaging  her,  are 
land-speculation  and  one-horse  politicians."  He  also  remarked 
that  it  took  three  log  houses  to  make  a  city  in  Kansas,  but 
they  begin  calling  it  a  city  so  soon  as  they  have  staked  out 
lots.  But  he  liked  the  Territory  better  than  he  had  expected 
to,  and  his  descriptions  of  the  country,  the  cities  and  towns, 
were  in  the  main  highly  favourable.  But  he  could  not  for- 
get the  "land-sharks"  and  one-horse  politicians  aforesaidJftr 
"Adieu,"  he  said  at  Manhattan,  "to  friendly  greetings  and. 
speakings!  Adieu  for  a  time  to  pen  and  paper!  Adieu  to 
bed-rooms  and  wash-bowls!  Adieu  (let  me  hope)  to  cold  rains 
and  flooded  rivers!  Hurrah  for  Pike's  Peak!  " 

In  his  next  letter,  dated  at  "  Station  9,  Pike's  Peak  Express 
Co.,  Pipe  Creek,  May  28,  1859,"  he  gives  the  progress  he  had 
recently  made  toward  primitive  simplicity  as  follows: 

"  I  believe  I  have  now  descended  the  ladder  of  artificial  life  nearly  to  its 
lowest  round.  If  the  Cheyennes  —  thirty  of  whom  stopped  the  last  ex- 
press down  on  the  route  we  must  traverse,  and  tried  to  beg  or  steal  from  it 
—  shall  see  fit  to  capture  and  strip  us,  we  shall  probably  have  further 
experience  in  the  same  line;  but  for  the  present  the  progress  I  have  made 
during  the  last  fortnight  toward  the  primitive  simplicity  of  human  exist- 
ence  may  be  roughly  noted  thus : 

"  May  12th. —  CHICAGO. —  Chocolate  and  morning  newspapers  last  seen 
on  the  breakfast-table. 

"23d. — LEAVENWORTH. — Room-bells  and  baths  make  their  disappearance. 

"24th. —  TOPEKA. —  Beef-steak  and  wash-bowls  (other  than  tin)  last 
visible.  Barber  ditto. 

"26th. —  MANHATTAN. —  Potatoes  and  eggs  last  recognized  among  the 
blessings  that  'brighten  as  they  take  their  flight.'  Chairs  ditto. 

"27th. — JUNCTION  CITY. —  Last  visitation  of  a  boot-black,  with  dissolv- 
ing views  of  a  board  bedroom.  Beds  bid  us  good-by. 

"28th. —  PIPE  CREEK. —  Benches  for  seats  at  meals  have  disappeared, 
giving  place  to  bags  and  boxes.  We  (two  passengers  of  a  scribbling  turn) 
write  our  letters  in  the  express-wagon  that  has  borne  us  by  day,  and  must 
supply  us  lodgings  for  the  night.  Thunder  and  lightning  from  both  south 
and  west  give  strong  promise  of  a  shower  before  morning.  Dubious  looks 
at  several  holes  in  the  canvass  covering  of  the  wagon.  Our  trust,  under 
Providence,  is  in  buoyant  hearts  and  an  India-rubber  blanket.  Good- 
night." 


314  LIFE   OF  HORACE  GREELET. 

Here  he  came  into  the  buffalo  country.  He  was  struck  with 
amazement  at  the  immense  number  of  these  animals.  He 
was  confident  he  saw  a  million  in  a  single  day.  He  pro- 
nounced the  prairie-dog  the  funny  fellow  of  those  parts,  and 
admitted  that  he  and  the  owl  lived  amicably  together  in  the 
same  hole,  but  he  indignantly  denied  "  that  the  rattlesnake  is 
ever  admitted  as  a  third  partner."  But  he  speedily  retracted. 
In  his  very  next  letter  he  says: 

"  Speaking  of  rattlesnakes — I  hasten  to  retract  the  skepticism  avowed  in 
a  former  letter  as  to  the  usual  and  welcome  residence  of  these  venomous 
.  serpents  in  the  prairie-dog's  burrow.  The  evidence  of  the  fact  is  too 
direct  and  reliable  to  be  gainsayed.  It  is  idle  to  attempt  holding  out 
against  facts;  so  I  have  pondered  this  anomaly  until  I  think  I  clearly 
comprehend  it.  The  case  is  much  like  that  of  some  newspaper  establish- 
ments, whose  proprietors,  it  is  said,  find  it  convenient  to  keep  on  their 
staff  '  a  broth  of  a  boy '  from  Tipperary,  standing  six  feet  two  in  his 
stockings  and  measuring  a  yard  or  more  across  the  shoulders,  who  stands 
ready,  with  an  illegant  brogue,  a  twinkle  in  his  eye,  and  a  hickory  sapling 
firmly  grasped  in  his  dexter  fist,  to  respond  to  all  choleric,  peremptory 
customers,  who  call  of  a  morning,  hot  with  wrath  and  bristling  with  cow- 
hide, to  demand  a  parley  with  the  editor.  The  cayota  is  a  gentleman  of 
an  inquiring,  investigating  turn,  who  is  an  adept  at  excavation,  and  whose 
fondness  for  prairie-dog  is  more  ardent  than  flattering.  To  dig  one  out 
and  digest  him  would  be  an  easy  task,  if  he  were  alone  in  his  den,  or  with 
only  the  owl  as  his  partner;  but  when  the  firm  is  known  or  strongly  sus- 
pected to  be  Prairie-Dog,  Rattlesnake,  &  Co.,  the  cayota's  passion  for 
subterranean  researches  is  materially  cooled.  The  rattlesnake  is  to  the 
concern  what  the  fighting  editor  is  to  the  journalistic  organizations  afore- 
said. And  thus,  while  my  faith  is  enlarged,  is  my  reason  satisfied." 

While  crossing  the  Desert,  Mr.  Greeley  met  with  an  accident 
from  an  upset  whereby  he  received  a  cut  on  his  left  cheek,  and 
"  a  deep  gouge  "  in  his  left  leg  below  the  knee,  "  with  a  pretty 
smart  concussion  generally,  but  not  a  bone  started  nor  a  tendon 
strained."  So  off  he  started  on  a  brisk  walk  through  a  scene 
of  utter  desolation  to  the  next  station.  He  arrived  at  Denver 
on  the  morning  of  June  6.  "A  true  picture  of  gold-seekers," 
he  says,  "  setting  out  from  home,  trim  and  jolly,  for  Pike's 
Peak,  and  of  those  same  gold-seekers,  sober  as  judges,  and 
slow-moving  as  their  own  weary  oxen,  dropping  into  Denver, 
would  convey  a  salutary  lesson  to  many  a  sanguine  soul.  Nay, 
I  have  in  my  mind's  eye  an  individual  who  rolled  out  of 


DENVER  IN   1859.  315 

Leavenworth,  barely  thirteen  days  ago,  in  a  satisfactory  rig, 
and  a  spirit  of  adequate  self-complacency,  but  who — though 
his  hardships  have  been  nothing  to  theirs — dropped  into  Den- 
ver this  morning  in  a  sobered  and  thoughtful  frame  of  mind, 
in  dust-begrimed  and  tattered  habiliments,  with  a  patch  on  his 
cheek,  a  bandage  on  his  leg,  and  a  limp  in  his  gait,  altogether 
constituting  a  spectacle  most  rueful  to  behold." 

Mr.  Greeley  remained  at  Denver  several  days,  and  visited 
the  "diggings"  round  about.  At  Gregory's  Diggings,  he 
made  a  speech  to  some  fifteen  hundred  or  two  thousand  people. 
He  told  the  audience  many  plain  truths,  speaking  of  postal 
and  express  facilities,  the  Pacific  railroad,  the  then  proposed 
Rocky  Mountain  State,  and  did  not  fail  to  condemn  the  vices 
of  gambling  and  intemperance.  Mr.  Greeley  thought  that 
the  Rocky  Mountains,  with  their  grand,  aromatic  forests,  their 
grassy  glades,  their  frequent  springs,  and  dancing  streams  of 
the  brightest,  sweetest  water,  their  pure,  elastic  atmosphere, 
and  their  unequalled  game  and  fish,  were  destined  to  be  a 
favourite  resort  and  home  of  civilized  man.  He  saw  a  great 
many  Indians  and  hence  "  learned  to  appreciate  better  than 
hitherto,  and  to  make  more 'allowance  for,  the  dislike,  aversion, 
contempt,  wherewith  they  are  usually  regarded  by  their  white 
neighbours,  and  have  been  since  the  days  of  the  Puritans." 
He  judged  that  the  only  practicable  mode  by  which  the  In- 
dians could  be  made  clean,  industrious,  and  civilized,  would  be 
by  special  attention  to  the  education  of  the  women.  Denver, 
now  a  large,  thriving  city,  with  daily  newspapers  and  all  the 
evidences  of  progress  and  civilization,  was  then  a  collection  of 
huts.  On  the  opposite  bank  of  Cherry  Creek,  fust  before  it  is 
lost  in  the  South  Platte,  was  Auraria — rival  "city."  In  a 
letter  to  The  Tribune,  Mr.  Greeley  describes  life  in  Denver  in 
1859: 

"  Of  these  rival  cities,  Auraria  is  by  far  the  more  venerable — some  of  its 
structures  being,  I  think,  fully  a  year  old,  if  not  more.  Denver,  on  the 
other  hand,  can  boast  of  no  antiquity  beyond  September  or  October  last. 
In  the  architecture  of  the  two  cities  there  is,  notwithstanding,  a  striking 
similarity — cotton-wood  logs,  cut  from  the  adjacent  bottom  of  the  Platte, 
roughly  hewed  on  the  upper  and  under  sides,  and  chinked  with  billets  of 
split  cotton-wood  on  the  inner,  and  with  mud  on  the  outer  side,  forming 


31G  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

the  walls  of  nearly  or  quite  every  edifice  which  adorns  either  city.  Across 
the  center  of  the  interior,  from  shorter  wall  to  wall,  stretches  a  sturdy 
ridge-pole,  usually  in  a  state  of  nature,  from  which  '  shooks,'  or  split 
saplings  of  cotton-wood,  their  split  sides  down,  incline  gently  to  the  trans- 
verse or  longer  sides;  on  these  (in  the  more  finished  structures)  a  coating 
of  earth  is  laid ;  and,  with  a  chimney  of  mud-dauhed  sticks  in  one  corner, 
a  door  nearly  opposite,  and  a  hole  beside  it  representing  or  prefiguring  a 
window,  the  edifice  is  complete.  Of  course,  many  have  no  earth  on  their 
covering  of  shooks,  and  so  are  liable  to  gentle  inundation  in  the  rainy 
season;  but,  though  we  have  had  thunder  and  lightning  almost  daily,  with 
a  brisk  gale  in  most  instances,  there  has  been  no  rain  worth  naming  such 
here  for  weeks,  and  the  unchinked,  barely  shook-covered  houses,  through 
whose  sides  and  roofs  you  may  see  the  stars  as  you  lie  awake  nights,  are 
decidedly  the  cooler  and  airier.  There  is  a  new  hotel  nearly  finished  in 
Auraria,  which  has  a  second  story  (but no  first  story)  floor;  beside  this, 
mine  eyes  have  never  yet  been  blessed  with  the  sight  of  any  floor  what- 
ever in  either  Denver  or  Auraria.  The  last  time  I  slept  or  ate  with  a  floor 
under  me  (our  wagon-box  and  mother  earth  excepted)  was  at  Junction- 
City,  nearly  four  weeks  ago.  The  '  Denver  House,'  which  is  the  Astor 
House  of  the  gold  region,  has  walls  of  logs,  a  floor  of  earth,  with  windows 
and  roof  of  rather  flimsy  cotton-sheeting;  while  every  guest  is  allowed  as 
good  a  bed  as  his  blankets  will  make.  The  charges  are  no  higher  than 
at  the  Astor  and  other  first-class  hotels,  except  for  liquor — twenty-five 
cents  a  drink  for  dubious  whiskey,  coloured  and  nicknamed  to  suit  the 
taste  of  customers — being  the  regular  rate  throughout  this  region.  I  had 
the  honour  to  be  shaved  there  by  a  nephew  (so  he  assured  me)  of  Murat, 
Bonaparte's  king  of  Naples  —  the  honour  and  the  shave  together  costing 
but  a  paltry  dollar.  Still,  a  few  days  of  such  luxury  surfeited  me,  mainly 
because  the  main  ordrinking-room  was  also  occupied  by  several  blacklegs 
as  a  gambling-hall,  and  their  incessant  clamour  of '  Who  '11  go  me  twenty? 
The  ace  of  hearts  is  the  winning  card.  Whoever  turns  the  ace  of  hearts 
wins  the  twenty  dollars,'  etc.,  etc.,  persisted  in  at  all  hours  up  to  midnight, 
became  at  length  a  nuisance,  from  which  I  craved  deliverance  at  any 
price.  Then  the  visitors  of  that  drinking  and  gambling-room  had  a  care- 
less way,  when  drunk,  of  firing  revolvers,  sometimes  at  each  other,  at 
other  times  quite  miscellaneously,  which  struck  me  as  inconvenient  for  a 
quiet  guest  with  only  a  leg  and  a  half,  hence  in  poor  condition  for  dodg- 
ing bullets.  So  I  left. 

"  *  How  do  you  live  in  Denver?'  I  inquired  of  a  New- York  friend  some 
weeks  domiciled  here,  in  whose  company  I  visited  the  mines.  '  O,  I've 
jumped  a  cabin,'  was  his  cool,  matter-of-course  reply.  As  jumping  a  cabin 
was  rather  beyond  my  experience,  I  inquired  further,  and  learned  that, 
finding  an  uninhabited  cabin  that  suited  him,  he  had  quietly  entered  and 
spread  his  blankets,  eating  at  home  or  abroad  as  opportunity  might  sug- 
gest. I  found,  on  further  inquiry,  that  at  least  one-third  of  the  habitations 
in  Denver  and  Auraria  were  desolate  when  we  came  here  (they  have  been 
gradually  filling  up  since),  some  of  the  owners  having  gone  into  the 


BKIGHAM   YOUNG.  317 

mountains,  digging  or  prospecting,  and  taken  their  limited  supply  of 
household  goods  along  with  them ;  while  others,  discouraged  by  the  poor 
show  of  mining  six  weeks  ago,  when  even  the  nearer  mountains  were  still 
covered  with  snow  and  ice,  rushed  pell-mell  down  the  Platte  with  the  wild 
reflux  of  the  spring  emigration,  abandoning  all  but  what  they  could  carry 
away.  It  is  said  that  lots  and  cabins  together  sold  for  twenty-five  dollars — 
so  long  as  there  were  purchasers;  but  these  soon  failing,  they  were  left 
behind  like  camp-fires  in  the  morning,  and  have  since  been  at  the  service 
of  all  comers. 

"So,  in  company  with  a  journalizing  friend,  I,  too,  have  'jumped  a 
cabin,'  and  have  kept  to  it  quite  closely,  under  a  doctor's  care,  for  the  last 
week  or  ten  days.  It  is  about  ton  feet  square,  and  eight  feet  high,  rather 
too  well  chinked  for  summer,  considering  that  it  lacks  a  window,  but  must 
be  a  capital  house  for  this  country  in  winter.  I  board  with  the  nearest 
neighbour;  and  it  is  not  my  landlady's  fault  that  the  edible  resources  of 
Denver  are  decidedly  limited.  But  even  these  are  improving.  To  the 
bread,  bacon,  and  beans,  which  formed  the  staple  of  eveiy  meal  a  short 
time  age,  there  have  been  several  recent  additions ;  milk,  which  was  last 
week  twenty-five  cents  per  quart,  is  now  down  to  ten,  and  I  hear  a  rumour 
that  eggs,  owing  to  a  recent  increase  in  the  number  of  hens,  within  five 
hundred  miles,  from  four  or  five  to  twelve  or  fifteen,  are  about  to  fall  from 
a  dollar  a  dozen  to  fifty  cents  per  dozen.  On  every  side,  I  note  signs  of 
progress  —  improvement — manifest  destiny: — there  was  a  man  about  the 
city  yesterday  with  lettuce  to  sell — and  I  am  credibly  assured  that  there 
will  be  green  peas  next  month — actually  peas ! — provided  it  should  rain 
soakingly  meantime — whereof  a  hazy,  lowering  sky  would  seem  just  now 
to  afford  some  hope.  (P.  S.  The  hope  has  vanished.)  But  I — already 
sadly  behind,  and  nearly  able  to  travel  again — must  turn  my  back  on  this 
promise  of  luxuries,  and  take  the  road  to  Laramie  to-day,  or  at  furthest  to- 


From  Denver,  Mr.  Greeley  proceeded  to  Salt  Lake  City,  by 
way  of  Laramie,  the  South  Pass,  Big  Sandy,  and  Fort  Bridger. 
On  the  afternoon  of  July  13,  he  had,  by  appointment,  a  long 
interview  with  Brigham  Young,  upon  Mormonism  generally, 
which  he  thus  reports  in  a  letter  to  The  Tribune: 

My  friend  Dr.  Bernhisel,  late  delegate  in  Congress,  took  me  this  after- 
noon, by  appointment,  to  meet  Brigham  Young,  President  of  the  Mormoii 
Church,  who  had  expressed  a  willingness  to  receive  me  at  two  p.  M.  We 
were  very  cordially  welcomed  at  the  door  by  the  president,  who  led  us  into 
the  second-story  parlour  of  the  largest  of  his  houses  (he  has  three),  where 
I  was  introduced  to  Heber  C.  Kimball,  General  Wells,  General  Ferguson, 
Albert  Carrington,  Elias  Smith, .  and  several  other  leading  men  in  the 
church,  with  two  full- grown  sous  of  the  president.  After  some  ur'mpor- 
tant  conversation  on  general  topics,  I  stated  that  I  had  coi^0  '-  quest  of 


318  LIFE   OF  HORACE  GREELEY. 

fuller  knowledge  respecting  the  doctrines  and  polity  of  the  Mormon 
Church,  and  would  like  to  ask  some  questions  bearing  directly  on  these, 
if  there  were  no  objection.  President  Young  avowing  his  willingness  to 
respond  to  all  pertinent  inquiries,  the  conversation  proceeded  substan- 
tially as  follows : 

H.  G. — Am  I  to  regard  Mormonism  (so-called)  as  a  new  religion,  or  as 
simply  a  new  development  of  Christianity? 

B.  Y. — We  hold  that  there  can  be  no  true  Christian  Church,  without  a 
priesthood  directly  commissioned  by,  and  in  immediate  communication 
with  the  Son  of  God  and  Saviour  of  mankind.  Such  a  church  is  that  of 
the  Latter-Day  Saints,  called  by  their  enemies  Mormons ;  we  know  no  other 
that  even  pretends  to  have  present  and  direct  revelations  of  God's  will. 

H.  G. — Then  I  am  to  understand  that  you  regard  all  other  churches  pro- 
fessing to  be  Christian  as  the  Church  of  Rome  regards  all  churches  not  in 
communion  with  itself — as  schismatic,  heretical,  and  out  of  the  way  of 
salvation  ? 

B.  Y. — Yes,  substantially. 

H.  G. — Apart  from  this,  in  what  respect  do  your  doctrines  differ  essen- 
tially from  those  of  our  Orthodox  Protestant  Churches — the  Baptist  or 
Methodist,  for  example  ? 

B.  Y.-— We  hold  the  doctrines  of  Christianity,  as  revealed  in  the  Old  and 
New  Testaments — also  in  the  Book  of  Mormon,  which  teaches  the  same 
cardinal  truths  and  those  only. 

H.  G. — Do  you  believe  in  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity? 

B.  Y. — We  do ;  but  not  exactly  as  it  is  held  by  other  churches.  We 
oelievc  in  the  Father,  the  Son,  and  the  Holy  Ghost,  as  equal,  but  not  iden- 
eical — not  as  one  person  [being].*  We  believe  in  all  the  Bible  teaches  on 
kim  subject. 

R.  ». — Do  you  believe  in  a  personal  devil — a  distinct,  conscious,  spiritual 
<eing,  wnose  nature  And  acts  are  essentially  malignant  and  evil? 

B.  \.-Wedo. 

H.  G. — Do  you  hold  the  doctrine  of  eternal  punishment? 

B.  Y. — We  do ;  though  perhaps  not  exactly  as  other  churches  do.  We 
»<elieve  it  as  the  liibte  teaches  it. 

H.  G. — I  understand  that  you  regard  baptism  by  immersion  as  essential  ? 

B.  Y.— We  do. 

H.  G. — Do  you  practice  infant  baptism  ? 

B.  Y.— No. 

H.  G. — Do  you  ro«*ke  removal  to  these  valleys  obligatory  on  your  con- 
verts? 

A.  Y. — They  world  consider  themselves  greatly  aggrieved  if  they  were 
not  invited  hithe»>.  We  hold  to  such  a  gathering  together  of  God's  people, 
as  the  Bible  fo^tells,  and  that  this  is  the  place,  and  now  is  the  time 
appointed  for  i'*  consummation. 

'I  am  quit*  sure  that  President  Young  used  here  the  word  "person" 
as  I  have  it;  but  I  am  not  a \\aie  that  Christians  of  any  denomination  do 
regard  tins  Futher,  Son  snd  Holy  up  hit,  u  one  person. 


"  MORMONISM."  319 

B  il. — The  predictions  to  which  you  refer,  have  usually,  I  think,  been 
andt  rstood  to  indicate  Jerusalem  (or  Judea)  as  the  place  of  such  gathering. 

B.  Y. — Yes,  for  the  Jews — not  for  others. 

II.  G. — What  is  the  position  of  your  church  with  respect  to  slavery? 

B.  Y. — We  consider  it  of  divine  institution,  and  not  to  be  abolished 
until  the  curse  pronounced  on  Ham  shall  have  been  removed  from  his 
descendants. 

H.  G. — Are  any  slaves  now  held  in  this  territory  ? 

B.  Y.— There  are. 

H.  G. — Do  your  territorial  laws  uphold  slavery? 

B.  Y. — Those  laws-  are  printed — you  can  read  for  yourself.  If  slaves  are 
brought  here  by  those  who  owned  them  in  the  States,  we  do  not  favour 
their  escape  from  the  service  of  those  owners. 

H.  G. — Am  I  to  infer  that  Utah  if  admitted  as  a  member  of  the  Federal 
Union,  will  be  a  slave  State?' 

B.  Y. — No ;  she  will  be  a  free  State.  Slavery  here  would  prove  useless 
and  unprofitable.  I  regard  it  generally  as  a  curse  to  the  masters.  I  my- 
self hire  many  labourers,  and  pay  them  fair  wages;  I  could  not  afford  to 
own  them.  I  can  do  better  than  subject  myself  to  an  obligation  to  feed 
and  clothe  their  families,  to  provide  and  care  for  them  in  sickness  and 
health.  Utah  is  not  adapted  to  slave-labour. 

H.  G. — Let  me  now  be  enlightened  with  regard  more  especially  to  your 
church  polity ;  I  understand  that  you  require  each  member  to  pay  over 
one-tenth  of  all  he  produces  or  earns  to  the  church. 

B.  Y. — That  is  a  requirement  of  our  faith.  There  is  no  compulsion  as 
to  the  payment.  Each  member  acts  in  the  premises  according  to  his 
pleasure,  under  the  dictates  of  his  own  conscience. 

H.  G.—  »Vhat  is  done  with  the  proceeds  of  this  tithing? 

B.  Y. — Part  of  it  is  devoted  to  building  temples,  and  other  places  of 
worship ;  part  to  helping  the  poor  and  needy  converts  on  their  way  to  this 
country ;  and  the  largest  portion  to  the  support  of  the  poor  among  the 
saints. 

H.  G. — Is  none  of  it  paid  to  bishops,  and  other  dignitaries  of  the  church  ? 

B.  Y. — Not  one  penny.  No  bishop,  no  elder,  no  deacon,  no  other  church 
officer,  receives  any  compensation  for  his  official  services.  A  bishop  is 
often  required  to  put  his  hand  into  his  own  pocket,  and  provide  therefrom 
for  the  poor  of  his  charge ;  but  he  never  receives  anything  for  his  ser- 
vices. 

H.  G. — How,  then,  do  your  ministers  live  ? 

B.  Y. — By  the  labour  of  their  own  hands,  like  the  first  apostles.  Every 
bishop,  every  elder,  may  be  daily  seen  at  work  in  the  field  or  the  shop, 
like  his  neighbours;  every  minister  of  the  church  has  his  proper  calling, 
by  whi^h  he  earns  the  bread  of  his  family ;  he  who  cannot,  or  will  not  do 
the  church's  work  for  nothing  is  not  wanted  in  her  service;  even  our  law- 
yers (pointing  to  General  Ferguson  and  another  present,  who  are  the 
regular  lawyers  of  the  church),  are  paid  nothing  for  their  services;  I  am 
the  only  person  in  the  church  who  has  not  a  regular  calling  apart 


320  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

from  the  cnurch's  service,  and  I  never  received  one  farthing  from  her 
treasury;  if  I  obtain  anything  from  the  tithing-house,  I  am  charged  with, 
and  pay  for  it,  just  as  any  one  else  would;  the  clerks  in  the  tithing-store 
are  paid  like  other  clerks;  but  no  one  is  ever  paid  for  any  service  pertain- 
ing  to  the  ministry.  We  think  a  man  who  cannot  make  his  living  aside 
from  the  ministry  of  Christ  unsuited  to  that  office.  I  am  called  rich,  and 
consider  myself  worth  two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  dollars;  but  no 
dollar  of  it  was  ever  paid  me  by  the  church,  nor  for  any  service  as  a  min- 
ister of  the  everlasting  Gospel.  I  lost  nearly  all  I  had  when  we  were 
broken  up  in  Missouri,  and  driven  from  that  State.  I  was  nearly  stripped 
again,  when  Joseph  Smith  was  murdered,  and  we  were  driven  from 
Illinois;  but  nothing  was  ever  made  up  to  me  by  the  church,  nor  by  any 
one.  I  believe  I  know  .how  to  acquire  property,  and  how  to  take  care  of  it. 

H.  G. — Can  you  give  me  any  rational  explanation  of  the  aversion  and 
hatred  with  which  your  people  are  generally  regarded  by  those  among 
whom  they  have  lived  and  with  whom  they  have  been  brought  directly  in 
contact  ? 

B.  Y. — No  other  explanation  than  is  afforded  by  the  crucifixion  of  Christ 
and  the  kindred  treatment  of  God's  ministers,  prophets  and  saints  in  all 
ages. 

H.  G. — I  know  that  a  new  sect  is  always  decried  and  traduced — that  it 
is  hardly  ever  deemed  respectable  to  belong  to  one — that  the  Baptists, 
Quakers,  Methodists,  Universalists,  etc.,  have  each  in  their  turn  been 
regarded  in  the  infancy  of  their  sect  as  the  offscouring  of  the  earth ;  yet  I 
cannot  remember  that  either  of  them  were  ever  generally  represented  and 
regarded  by  the  older  sects  of  their  early  days  as  thieves,  robbers,  mur- 
derers. 

B.  T. — If  you  will  consult  the  cotemporary  Jewish  account  of  the  life 
and  acts  of  Jesus  Christ,  you  will  find  that  he  and  his  disciples  were 
accused  of  every  abominable  deed  and  purpose — robbery  and  murder 
included.  Such  a  work  is  still  extant,  and  may  be  found  by  those  who 
seek  it. 

H.  G. — What  do  you  say  of  the  so-called  Danites,  or  Destroying  Angels, 
belonging  to  your  church  ? 

B.  Y. — What  do  you  say?  Lknow  of  no  such  band,  no  such  persons  or 
organization.  I  hear  of  them  only  in  the  slanders  of  our  enemies. 

H.  G. — With  regard,  then,  to  the  grave  question  on  which  your  doctrines 
and  practices  are  avowedly  at  war  with  those  of  the  Christian  world — that 
of  a  plurality  of  wives — is  the  system  of  your  church  acceptable  to  the 
majority  of  its  women? 

B.  Y. — They  could  not  be  more  averse  to  it  than  I  was  when  it  was  first 
revealed  to  us  as  the  Divine  will.  I  think  they  generally  accept  it,  as  I 
do,  as  the  will  of  God. 

H.  G. — How  general  is  polygamy  among  you  ? 

B.  Y. — I  could  not  say.  Some  of  those  present  (heads  of  the  church) 
have  each  but  one  wife;  others  have  more:  each  determines  what  is  his 
individual  duty. 


"  MORMONISM. "  321 

H.  G. — What  \s  the  largest  mimber  of  wives  belonging  to  any  one  man? 

B.  Y. — I  have  fifteen ;  I  know  no  one  who  lias  more;  but  some  of  those 
sealed  to  me  are  old  ladies  whom  I  regard  rather  as  mothers  than  wives, 
but  whom  I  have  taken  home  to  cherish  and  support. 

H.  G. — Does  not  the  Apostle  Paul  say  that  a  bishop  should  be  "  the  hus- 
band of  one  wife  ?" 

B.  Y. — So  we  hold.  We  do  not  regard  any  but  a  married  man  as  fitted 
for  the  office  of  bishop.  But  the  apostle  docs  not  forbid  a  bishop  having 
more  wives  than  one. 

H.  G. — Does  not  Christ  say  that  he  who  puts  away  his  wife,  or  marries 
one  whom  another  has  put  away,  commits  adultery ! 

B.  Y. — Yes;  and  I  hold  that  no  man  should  ever  put  away  his  wife 
except  for  adultery — not  always  even  for  that.  Such  is  my  individual  view 
of  the  matter.  I  do  not  say  that  wives  have  never  been  put  away  in  our 
church,  but  that  I  do  not  approve  of  the  practice. 

H.  G. — How  do  you  regard  what  is  commonly  termed  the  Christian 
Sabbath  ? 

B.  Y. — As  a  divinely  appointed  day  of  rest.  We  enjoin  all  to  rest  from 
secular  labour  on  that  day.  We  would  have  no  man  enslaved  to  the  Sab- 
bath, but  we  enjoin  all  to  respect  and  enjoy  it. 

Such  is,  as  nearly  as  I  can  recollect,  the  substance  of  nearly  two  hours 
conversation,  wherein  much  was  said  incidentally  that  would  not  be 
worth  reporting,  even  if  I  could  remember  and  reproduce  it,  and  wherein 
others  bore  a  part ;  but  as  President  Young  is  the  first  minister  of  the 
Mormon  church,  and  bore  the  principal  part  in  the  conversation,  I  have 
reported  his  answers  alone  to  my  questions  and  observations.  The  others 
appeared  uniformly  to  defer  to  his  views,  and  to  acquiesce  fully  in  his 
responses  and  explanations.  He  spoke  readily,  not  always  with  gram- 
matical accuracy,  but  with  no  appearance  of  hesitation  or  reserve,  and 
with  no  apparent  desire  to  conceal  anything,  nor  did  he  repel  any  of  my 
questions  as  impertinent.  He  was  very  plainly  dressed  in  thin  summer 
clothing,  and  with  no  air  of  sanctimony  or  fanaticism.  In  appearance,  he 
is  a  portly,  frank,  good-natured,  rather  thick-set  man  of  fifty-five,  seeming 
to  enjoy  life,  and  to  be  in  no  particular  hurry  to  get  to  heaven.  His  asso- 
ciates are  plain  men,  evidently  born  and"  reared  to  a  life  of  labour,  and 
looking  as  little  like  crafty  hypocrites  or  swindlers  as  any  body  of  men  I 
ever  met.  The  absence  of  cant  or  snuffle  from  their  manner  was  marked 
and  general ;  yet,  I  think  I  may  fairly  say  that  their  Mormonism  has  not 
impoverished  them  —  that  they  were  generally  poor  men  when  they 
embraced  it,  and  are  now  in  very  comfortable  circumstances — as  men 
averaging  three  or  four  wives  apiece  certainly  need  to  be. 

Mr.  Greeley  judged  of  the  Mormon  religion  and  Mormon 
society  with   philosophical  impartiality.     The   spirit  of   the 
religion  appeared  to  him  Judaic  rather  than  Christian.     Nei- 
ther from  the  pulpit, — he  heard  two  lengthy  sermons, — nor 
21 


322  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

elsewhere  from  a  Mormon  did  lie  hear  a  single  spontaneous, 
hearty  recognition  of  the  essential  brotherhood  of  the  human 
race,  or  one  generous  prayer  for  the  enlightenment  and  salva- 
tion of  all  mankind.  The  Book  of  Mormons  he  discovered  to 
be  treated  as  of  equal  authority  and  importance  with  the  Old 
and  New  Testaments.  He  did  not  regard  the  great  body  of  the 
Mormons  as  knaves  and  hypocrites,  but  as  dupes  only.  The 
great  mass  of  the  people,  he  believed,  meant  to  be  honest,  just, 
and  humane,  but  they  were  before  and  above  all  things  else, 
Latter-Day  Saints,  or  Mormons,  and  in  the  name  of  religion, 
members  of  the  community  had  committed  the  greatest  of 
crimes  and  been  shielded  from  just  punishment  by  religious 
means.  He  did  not  find  a  single  Mormon  woman  who  approved 
of  polygamy  by  word  or  look,  and  he  believed  the  Mormons 
would  soon  receive  a  "revelation"  causing  them  to  give  up 
this  institution.  They  were  generally  industrious  and  frugal, 
and  had  no  outcasts  among  them.  But  upon  the  whole,  evil 
so  much  predominated  over  good  in  Mormon  society,  in  Mr. 
Greeley's  judgment,  which  was  certainly  based  upon  careful 
and  generous  observation, — that  he  made  it  the  occasion  of  a 
vigorous  and  lively  attack  upon  "  Popular  Sovereignty." 

During  his  stay  in  Salt  Lake  City,  Mr.  Greeley  attended  a 
meeting  of  the  Deseret  Typographical  Association.  Not  only 
printers,  but  noted  "  Saints  "  took  part  in  the  meeting,  and  in 
their  speeches  said  little  except  to  extol  Mormonism.  Mr. 
Greeley  being  called  out,  after  properly  referring  to  the  oppres- 
sion, of  which  some  of  the  "  Saints  "  had  spoken,  mentioned  the 
gigantic  oppression  of  slavery,  and  very  pointedly  condemned 
Mormon  silence  and  indifference  upon  that  subject.  At  a  later 
hour  in  the  evening,  some  one  arose  and  requested  that  Mr. 
Greeley  make  a  speech  setting  forth  his  views  upon  Woman's 
flights!  Whereupon,  it  being  about  time  for  supper,  he 
spoke  as  follows: 

"  Mr.  President,  I  can  make  the  speech  our  friend  required  in  just  one 
minute.  I  hold  it  the  right  of  every  woman  to  do  any  and  every  thing 
that  she  can  do  well,  provided  it  ought  to  be  done.  If  it  ought  not  to  be 
done  at  all,  or  if  she  cannot  do  it,  then  she  has  no  right  to  do  it;  but  if  it 
ought  to  be  done,  and  she  can  do  it,  then  her  right  to  do  it  is,  to  my 


ES   CALIFORNIA.  323 

mind,  indisputable.    And  that  is  all  that  I  have  to  say,  now  or  ever,  on 
the  subject  of  Woman's  Rights." 

From  the  city  of  Saints  he  proceeded  to  Sacramento,  by 
Camp  Floyd,  where  he  observed  certain  abuses  in  the  Army  to 
which  he  invited  the  attention  of  Congress;  down  the  Hum- 
boldt,  the  desolation  of  which  region  struck  him  as  greater 
than  that  of  the  American  Desert,  and  where,  he  says,  "  famine 
sits  enthroned,  and  waves  his  sceptre  over  a  dominion  exprsssly 
made  for  him;"  on  by  Carson  City,  to  the  Capital  of  our  new 
El  Dorado. 

On  reaching  California,  Mr.  Greeley  discovered  that  the  mili- 
tary authorities  of  Mexico  were  in  arms  against  him.  Some 
paper  had  published  a  burlesque  statement,  at  the  time  the 
journalist  was  travelling  over  the  plains,  that  he  was  coming 
to  California  to  take  command  of  all  the  filibusters,  and  to 
invade  and  conquer  Mexico!  The  Mexican  commander  at 
Mazatlan  took  this  hoax  as  a  matter  of  dead  earnest,  and  issued 
a  solemn  proclamation  warning  the  people  against  this  Horace 
Greeley  —  "a  most  diabolical,  bloodthirsty,  and  unmerciful 
man."  "This  dangerous  man,"  continued  the  Mexican,  "is 
not  of  the  common  school  of  filibusters:  they  wish  for  plunder, 
he  for  blood  and  murderous  deeds." 

Meantime,  Mr.  Greeley  proceeded  from  Placerville  as  the 
honoured  guest  of  the  Golden  State.  The  following  account 
of  this  portion  of  the  journey  and  of  his  reception  at  the 
Capital,  is  full  of  excellent  biographical  matter.  It  appeared 
in  The  Sacramento  Union  of  August  2,  1859, — a  journal  then 
as  now  conducted  with  enterprise,  ability,  and  notable  vivacity: 

"  On  Sunday  the  committee  of  arrangements  held  an  informal  meeting, 
and  the  committee  of  reception  detailed  to  meet  him  at  Folsom  were  put 
in  telegraphic  communication  with  the  master  of  ceremonies  at  Placer- 
ville;  the  result  of  which  was  an  agreement,  on  the  part  of  friends  of  the 
distinguished  stranger  in  the  latter  city,  to  deliver  him  on  Monday  after- 
noon, in  good  order  and  sound  condition,  by  private  conveyance,  to  such 
of  his  friends  in  Sacramento  as  should  be  in  waiting  at  Folsom.  J.  P. 
Robinson,  Superintendent  of  the  Sacramento  Valley  Railroad,  placed  a 
special  train  at  the  service  of  the  committee,  with  the  freedom  of  the  road 
to  all  they  should  invite  to  accompany  them. 

"  Horace  Greeley  passed  the  night,  or  such  portions  of  it  as  he  wa» 


324  LIFE   OF   HORACE   OREELEY. 

allowed  to  have  to  himself,  at  the  Gary  House,  and  left  Placerville  at  11.20 
A.  M.,  in  company  with  G.  W.  Swan  of  that  city,  in  an  open-front,  two- 
horse  carriage.  At  Mud  Springs,  about  one  hundred  and  fifty  of  the 
townspeople  and  miners  had  assembled  to  greet  him,  under  a  banner 
stretched  across  the  street.  Greeley  did  not,  however,  leave  his  seat,  but 
exchanged  salutations  with  the  citizens  at  the  door  of  the  carriage.  On 
the  way  down  the  mountains,  Mr.  Swan's  lively  and  observant  companion 
noticed  with  frequent  exclamationg  of  wonder  the  enterprise  and  labour 
evinced  in  mining  operations,  and  the  miners'  apparatus  for  conveying 
water:  spoke  of  the  barrenness  of  the  hillsides,  but  thought  it  strange 
that  the  fertile  spots  in  the  valleys  should  be  left  unoccupied  by  tillers  of 
the  soil  after  the  miners  had  denuded  the  hillsides  of  gold ;  expressed 
great  surprise,  as  all  new-comers  do,  at  the  fine  appearance  of  our  cattle 
contrasted  with  the  apparent  lean  and  dry  pasturage;  thought  the  fruit  in 
the  gardens  by  the  roadsides  looked  astonishingly  thrifty ;  and  after  some 
further  observations  of  the  same  character,  and  partaking  with  a  good 
appetite  of  the  dinner  served  for  him  and  his  companion  at  Padurah,  the 
head  of  the  great  American  press  sank  quietly  back  in  one  corner  of  the 
carriage,  and  was  prone  to  indulge  in  such  unrefreshing  slumber  as  a 
•warm  day  over  a  dusty  and  tiresome  road  can  alone  inspire. 

"While  the  editor  of  The  New- York  Tribune  slept  his  friends  were  wide 
awake  in  the  '  City  of  the  Plains.'  At  2.30  p.  M.  the  reception  committee, 
and  about  twenty -five  or  thirty  others  whom  they  had  invited,  stepped  into 
a  special  car,  and,  under  the  convoy  of  Superintendent  Robinson,  were 
soon  flying  on  their  road  to  Folsom.  The  committee  reached  Folsom  in 
forty  minutes  by  the  Superintendent's  watch,  and  learned,  on  arriving, 
that  the  'man  with  the  white  coat'  had  not  yet  made  his  appearance.  The 
receptionists  strolled  about  the  interesting  town  of  Folsom,  and,  their 
hospitable  ardour  communicating  to  sundry  of  the  inhabitants,  the  cannon 
was  brought  out,  and  soon  a  thundering  report,  which  must  have  wakened 
Greeley  a  mile  distant,  if  he  had  slept  until  that  time,  announced  that  the 
friends  of  the  great  expected  were  ready  to  receive  him  with  open  arms. 
At  a  quarter  to  four,  a  carriage  drawn  by  a  pair  of  roan-coloured  ponies 
drove  at  a  pretty  smart  pace  down  the  main  street,  and  straight  up  to  the 
depot.  By  this  time  most  of  the  committee  had  wandered  off  in  the  vicin- 
ity of  the  bridge,  so  that  when  the  proprietor  of  a  little  old  glazed 
travelling-bag,  marked  '  H.  GREELEY,  154  Nassau  Street,  New- York,  1855,' 
a  very  rusty  and  well-worn  ichite  coat,  a  still  rustier  and  still  more  worn 
and  faded  blue-cotton  umbrella,  together  with  a  roll  of  blankets,  were 
deposited  from  the  carriage,  there  was  no  one  present  of  the  committee  to 
take  him  by  the  hand.  The  crowd  about  the  depot,  however,  closed  in  so 
densely  that  Greeley  was  fain  to  make  for  the  first  open  door  that  presented 
itself.  This,  unfortunately,  happened  to  be  the  bar-room  attached  to  the 
ticket-office ;  and  here  some  of  the  committee  found  him,  with  his  back 
turned  defiantly  against  the  sturdy  rows  of  bottles  and  decanters,  talking 
informally  with  some  friends  who  had  been  beforehand :  and  here  the 
*>minittee  seized  their  guest,  and  with  considerable  trepidation  hurried 


IN   CALIFORNIA.  325 

bini  across  to  the  hotel  over  the  freight  depot,  followed  by  a  large  and 
increasing  crowd.  Greeley  was  escorted  to  an  upper  room,  Avhere  J. 
McClatchy,  on  behalf  of  the  committee,  found  opportunity  to  welcome 
him  in  set  phrase,  in  about  the  following  language:  — 

"  'MR.  GREELEY:  This  committee,  chosen  by  the  citizens  of  Sacramento 
without  regard  to  party,  have  waited  upon  you  to  bid  you  welcome  to  the 
capital  of  the  State.  The  people  of  our  city  have  long  looked  upon  you 
as  one  of  the  noblest  friends  of  California.  They  desire  to  show  their 
appreciation  of  your  labours  in  its  behalf  by  giving  you  a  cordial  wel- 
come. Arrangements  have  been  made  in  our  city  to  receive  you  and  make 
your  stay  agreeable,  and  we  are  ready  at  your  leisure,  to  escort  you  to  the 
friends  who  are  waiting  your  coming.  In  their  name,  and  in  the  name  of 
this,  their  committee,  I  welcome  you  to  our  city.' 

"Mr.  Greeley  replied  very  nearly  as  follows:  — 

" '  I  should  have  been  glad,  if  I  could  have  had  my  choice,  to  have 
avoided  a  formal  reception,  because  it  looks  like  parade,  and  gives  an  idea 
of  seeking  for  glory,  which  is  not  a  part  of  my  plan  in  coming  to  Cali- 
fornia. I  shall  be  happy,  however,  to  go  with  you,  and  to-night  I  would 
like  to  say  something  about  the  Pacific  Railroad.  I  am  at  your  service, 
gentlemen,  this  evening,  but  I've  got  my  business  affairs  to  tend  to  after- 
ward.  I  have  not  yet  seen  my  letters :  they  are  waiting  for  me  in  your 
city.  I  have  other  places  to  visit,  and  wish  to  see  all  I  can,  and  meet  all 
the  friends  I  can  here  and  elsewhere.' 

"These  remarks  were  delivered  in  the  peculiar  off-hand  manner  of  the 
great  Reformer,  and  in  the  high'  key  and  slender  and  wavering  tones 
which  are  characteristic  of  his  public  speaking.  When  he  had  finished 
there  was  a  little  pause,  as  though  each  of  the  committee  was  cogitating 
what  next  was  to  be  done,  when  Greeley  broke  in  with  the  bluntness  so 
often  ascribed  to  him,  'Well,  I'm  ready  to  go  when  you  are.'  O.  C. 
Wheeler,  Secretary  of  the  State  Agricultural  Society,  now  extended  an 
invitation  to  him  to  accompany  the  visiting  committee  on  their  rounds  of 
visits  among  the  farms  and  orchards  of  the  State,  setting  out  next  week ; 
which  invitation  Greeley  thought  he  would  accept,  but  must  take  it  under 
consideration.  After  several  persons  had  been  introduced,  Greeley  was 
escorted  back  to  the  depot,  followed  by  'all  Folsom  for  four  miles  back,' 
as  one  of  the  crowd  declared.  Near  the  ticket-office,  having  signified  to 
the  committee  that  he  would  like  to  say  something  to  the  people,  Mr. 
Mooney  of  the  Folsom  Express  enjoined  silence,  and  Greeley  said:  — 

"' FELLOW-CITIZENS:  I  know  very  well  that  occasions  like  this  are  not 
such  as  a  person  should  choose  for  the  purpose  of  making  a  speech,  and  I 
d  )  not  wish  to  be  regarded  as  having  come  among  you  for  speech-making. 
1  have  come  to  your  far-off  land  as  an  American  comes  to  visit  Americans. 
I  don't  have  time  to  read  books,  and  I  want  to  learn  what  I  can  of  the 
men  and  country  I  have  come  to  see  by  practical  observation.  I  want  to 
see  the  land  which,  during  the  last  ten  years,  has  furnished  gold  enough 
to  check,  if  it  could  not  entirely  overcome,  the  tide  of  reverse  following 
the  commercial  extravagance  of  the  East.  One  of  the  objects  of  n?y  visit 


326  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

has  been  to  see  what  it  is  practicable  to  accomplish  for  the  Pacific  Kail, 
road.  [Cheers.]  I  know  that  great  difficulties  and  obstacles  lie  in  the 
way,  but  I  also  know  that  every  addition  of  wealth  and  population  on  this 
side  lessens  those  difficulties,  —  every  one  hundred  thousand  souls  you 
receive  into  your  State  increases,  not  the  necessity,  for  that  has  all  along 
existed,  but  the  imminence  of  that  necessity,  so  to  speak.  It  is  a  work 
which  must  be  done  in  our  day,  and,  if  we  live  the  ordinary  lives  of  men, 
we  shall  see  it  accomplished.  Every  wave  of  emigration  to  your  shores 
will  beat  down  an  obstable.  I  entreat  you  then,  fellow-citizens,  to  go  on 
and  draw  around  you  the  means  for  this  great  fulfilment  of  the  noble  plan. 
Let  us  build  up  an  American  Republic,  not  as  now,  the  two  sides  of  a 
great  desert,  but  let  us  make  a  concentrated  and  harmonious  whole.  Those 
who  come  to  join  you  here  should  not  pursue  the  journey  as  now,  wearily, 
sadly,  and  by  slow  degrees,  over  these  great  plains.  We  must  work  with 
all  our  energies  for  the  prosperity  of  the  Pacific  Railroad.  [Cheers.]  I 
thank  you  for  the  manner  in  which  you  have  welcomed  me,  and  I  shall 
return  home  to  labour  with  increased  vigour  for  the  road  and  for  the  suc- 
cess of  the  Union.' 

"This  short  speech  was  greeted  with  hearty  applause  by  over  one  hun- 
dred and  fifty  persons,  who  had  assembled  to  catch  a  sight  of  the  flaxen 
locks  and  benevolent  face  of  Horace  Greeley.  At  its  close  he  was  con- 
ducted into  the  car,  and  the  committee  and  their  guest  were  soon  on  their 
way  to  this  city  at  a  rattling  pace. 

"The  committee  of  arrangements  had  prepared  seven  carriages  to  be  in 
waiting  at  the  depot,  on  the  arrival  of  the  car  containing  their  guest.  A 
telegraphic  despatch  announced  the  moment  of  his  departure  from 
Folsom.  In  less  time  than  it  had  taken  to  go  out,  the  whistle  was  heard 
announcing  that  the  train  was  coming  down  the  levee.  As  the  car 
approached  the  city,  the  committee,  who  had  up  to  this  time  been  acting 
without  much  concert  or  regularity,  found  a  rare  subject  for  a  concurrence 
of  speech,  at  least,  in  Greeley's  old  white  coat  and  umbrella.  Some  of  the 
ragged  parts  of  the  coat  were  converted  into  little  mementos  by  the  more 
enterprising  members  of  the  committee.1  It  was  about  five  o'clock  when 
the  train  reached  the  depot.  Greeley  was  handed  into  a  carriage,  accom- 
panied by  the  committee  distributed  through  the  other  vehicles,  and  waa 
driven  to  the  St.  George  Hotel,  where  rooms  have  been  in  keeping  for  him 
several  days.  In  the  parlour  of  this  hotel  a  large  crowd  soon  began  to 
gather,  and  H.  L.  Nichols,  President  of  the  Board  of  Supervisors,  making 
his  appearance,  with  other  members  of  the  general  committee,  was  intro- 
duced to  their  guest  by  D.  Meeker.  Dr.  Nichols  then  made  the  following 
address :  — 

"  '  MR.  GREELEY:  It  is  with  pleasure,  sir,  that,  on  behalf  of  the  citizens 
of  Sacramento,  I  welcome  you  to  our  city.  It  is  probable  that  but  few  of 
us  have  had  the  honour  of  your  personal  acquaintance ;  but,  sir,  you  are 
not  unknown  to  us.  You  are  known  to  us  as  you  are  known  to  the  world 
at  large;  but  more  particularly  are  you  known  to  us  as  "the  true  friend  of 
California,  and  as  such  we  are  ever  proud  to  acknowledge  you.  We  thank 


SACRAMENTO.  327 

you  that  you  have  taken  sufficient  interest  in  our  welfare  to  leavw  your 
home  in  the  great  metropolis  of  the  East  and  wend  your  way  across  the 
vast  plains  and  rugged  mountains  that  separate  us,  to  visit  us  in  oui  West- 
ern home.  We  trust  that,  while  you  travel  through  our  State,  you  may 
not  be  disappointed  with  the  progress  which  our  citizens  have  made  dur- 
ing the  short  time  allowed  them.  Perhaps  you  may  be  aware,  sir,  that 
the  place  which  you  now  behold  as  the  city  of  Sacramento  was  but  little 
more  than  ten  years  ago  a  vast  plain,  with  here  and  there  a  few  cloth  tents, 
which  were  occupied  by  the  hardy  pioneers  of  the  State.  We  to-day 
in  size  claim  to  be  the  second  city  on  the  Pacific  coast;  our  inhabitants 
number  not  less  than  15,000;  we  have  a  "property  valuation  of  nearly 
$10,000,000;  we  have  erected  comfortable  dwellings  for  our  families,  and 
houses  for  places  of  business;  reared  numerous  and  ample  churches  dedi- 
cated to  the  worship  of  Almighty  God,  and  established  schools  for  the 
education  of  our  children,  —  in  fact,  we  enjoy  most  of  the  blessings  that 
our  sister  cities  in  the  East  may  laj^  claim  to.  The  hospitalities  of  this 
our  city  I  extend  to  you,  and  trust  that  during  your  sojourn  here  we  may 
be  enabled  to  make  your  stay  pleasant  and  agreeable,  so  that  when  you 
return  to  your  home  in  the  East,  and  may  have  occasion  to  refer  in  mem- 
ory to  the  few  days  spent  with  us,  your  feelings  may  be  rather  of  pleasure 
than  of  regret.  Now,  sir,  permit  me  again,  in  my  own  behalf  and  in 
behalf  of  my  fellow-citizens,  to  bid  you  a  hearty  and  cordial  welcome  to 
the  City  of  the  Plains,  —  the  capital  city  of  the  Golden  State.' 

"  The  address  was  followed  by  a  round  of  applause,  after  which  Mr 
Greeley  spoke  as  follows :  — 

" '  MR.  CHAIRMAN  :  It  was  observed  by  a  great  Southern  statesman  that 
the  American  Revolution  was  not  that  unnatural  or  chance  struggle,  not 
that  abnormal  thing  which  we  were  disposed  to  think  it.  The  Colony 
that  stepped  ashore  on  Plymouth  Rock  were  no  longer  a  Colony,  but  a 
State,  from  that  hour.  It  is  thus  that  American  genius  and  American 
cultivation  go  before,  and  improvise  the  arts  and  a  nation's  polity.  Ten 
years  ago  you  were  here  familiar  with  hangings  and  mob  law.  I  was  in 
London,  and  I  well  remember  the  remark  of  a  British  nobleman,  that 
your  course  was  the  proper  working  out  of  the  old  English  law.  Men 
must  obey  the  voice  of  the  community,  which  is  the  law,  in  all  cases;  and, 
if  they  do  not,  they  must  suffer  the  penalty  of  their  offending  equally  in 
orderly  as  well  as  in  disorderly  states  of  government.  The  progress  you 
have  made  in  carrying  out  your  principles  of  government  successfully  is 
your  highest  triumph.  Better  than  your  gold  or  your  thrift  is  the  fact 
that  here  is  a  population,  made  up  of  New-Englanders,  men  of  the  South, 
foreign-born,  natives  of  China  and  almost  every  part  of  the  globe,  which 
gradually,  through  periods  of  disorder,  you  have  reduced  to  the  best 
forms  of  enlightenment,  crystallizing  them,  so  to  speak,  in  a  perfect  and 
durable  shape.  I  do  think  this  is  better  than  gold,  for  that  the  savages 
can  dig. 

"'Your  schools,  your  churches,  and  your  obedience  to  the  laws  are  your 
greatest  wealth.  And  the  secret  of  your  success  is,  that  labour  here  meets 


328  LEFE   OF   HORACE  QREELEY. 

its  just  reward.  California  labour  rejoices  in  that  assurance.  I  heard 
them  talk  of  the  '  want  of  capital '  in  California.  I  do  not  think  capital  is 
necessary.  When  people  want  labour,  and  can  get  it,  it  is  better  than 
capital.  [Applause.]  Your  gold  product  gives  assurance  that  the  labour 
will  always  find  this  reward.  At  the  same  time  your  gold  gives  an  impulse 
to  civilization,  and  I  think  it  is  safe  to  promise  that  your  State  will  increase 
until  it  becomes  the  most  populous  in  the  Union.  [Applause.]  I  came 
this  long  way  not  to  see  California  alone.  I  wanted  to  see  those  interesting 
spaces  where  the  most  primitive  forms  of  life  can  be  viewed  and  contrasted 
within  the  borders  of  our  own  Republic  with  the  highest  civilization.  I 
wish  to  study  men  as  I  can  see  them  in  their  cabins,  and  to  improve  by 
observation  what  I  have  been  denied  acquiring  through  books  and  the 
essays  of  wise  men.  I  would  gladly  have  come  to  your  city  as  any  stran- 
ger, satisfied  with  meeting  here  and  there  an  old  acquaintance,  and  so 
passed  along  without  formality  and  public  attention.  I  was  aware  that  I 
knew  some  among  you,  but  I  had  no  idea  of  meeting  so  many  old  friends. 
And  though  J  would  have  been  glad  to  avoid  a  reception,  still  I  cannot 
refuse  to  meet  you  in  such  a  way  as  you  think  proper.  Gentlemen,  I 
thank  you  for  your  kindness.  I  have  done.'  [Applause.] 

"  A  large  number  of  citizens,  at  the  conclusion  of  his  speech,  were 
introduced  to  Mr.  Greeley.  All  who  have  known  him  in  the  East  remark 
that  he  has  never  appeared  so  hearty  and  well  as  at  present.  lie  looked 
somewhat,  jaded  and  dusty  from  his  long  ride,  but  showed  no  signs  of 
weariness.  The  crowd  left  him  at  5%,  and  he  was  not  disturbed  until  he 
was  waited  upon  to  accompany  a  portion  of  the  committee  to  a  very 
handsome  dinner.  About  twenty  guests  sat  down  at  6%,  and,  after  dis- 
patching the  meal  in  a  business-like  way,  Greeley  was  permitted  to  retire, 
and  make  ready  for  the  evening's  address.  From  the  rapidity  with  which 
this  was  done,  it  is  fair  to  presume  that  he  had  only  to  get  his  hat.  A  few 
minutes  after  eight  he  was  on  his  way  to  'Benton's  Church.'  At  the 
church  he  delivered  a  very  able  and  telling  speech  upon  the  Pacific 
Railroad." 

The  same  journal  thus  speaks  at  length  of  Mr.  Greeley's 
visit  and  the  influence  it  would  be  likely  to  have  in  the  great 
enterprise  in  which  California  was  so  deeply  interested: 

"Gree.tyhas  come  and  gone.  He  was  here  a  little  short  of  thirteen 
hours,  during  which  time  he  held  an  informal  levee,  made  a  reception 
speech,  partook  of  a  special  dinner,  delivered  an  address,  saw  something 
of  the  city,  opened  and  read  his  letters,  partly  arranged  the  programme  of 
his  journey  through  the  State,  and  took  a  sufficient  night's  rest  to  enable 
him  to  be  up  at  five  the  next  morning,  and  take  his  seat  in  the  stage  which 
left  the  next  hour  for  Grass  Valley,  a  journey  of  between  sixty  and  seventy 
miles  over  a  wearisome  mountain  road.  This  despatch  is  characteristic 
of  the  man.  His  prompt,  business-like  method,  and  his  skill  in  crowding 
events  into  a  narrow  compass,  not  less  than  his  facility  of  compressing 


AMONG   THE   MINES.  329 

facts  and  arguments  in  a  short,  off-hand  speech,  would  commend  him  to 
popular  admiration  in  this  country,  if  he  had  no  other  qualities  to  support 
his  fame.  His  brief  personal  intercourse  with  our  citizens  while  here, 
and  his  practical  suggestions  on  the  Pacific  Railroad,  accompanied  by  the 
earnest  and  forcible  manner  of  their  delivery,  have  made  a  favourable 
impression  in  the  community.  At  Folsom,  where  he  was  received  by  the 
committee  sent  from  this  city,  and  where  he  volunteered  a  short  address, 
the  crowd  were  at  first  sensibly  moved  to  attempt  a  little  good-humoured 
joking  at  the  quaint  personal  appearance  of  the  philosopher  and  his  odd 
style  of  oratory,  but  before  he  had  finished  his  second  or  third  sentence, 
their  attention  was  very  earnestly  on  the  speaker,  and  he  was  interrupted 
as  well  as  complimented  at  the  close,  by  hearty  cheering.  This  good  opin- 
ion appears  to  extend  to  all  classes,  if  we  except  the  ultra  Southern 
politicians;  and  a  general  wish  is  felt  to  hear  further  from  this  editor, 
who  writes  for,  and  is  believed  by  220,000  '  subscribers,'  and  who  has  taken 
the  field  in  person  and  in  our  midst,  a  Peter  the  Hermit  in  enthusiasm  for 
the  Pacific  Railroad.  While  this  '  abolition  editor,'  this  '  wretched  fanatic,' 
according  to  that  moderate  Lecompton  organ,  the  '  San  Francisco  Herald,' 
is  appealing  to  our  national  sympathies  on  this  railroad  question,  declar- 
ing that  it  is  not  a  question  of  localities;  that,  'whether  it  runs  to  New- 
York,  or  to  San  Antonia,  Texas  (the  favourite  route  of  the  'San  Francisco 
Herald '),  it  would  be  all  the  same,'  the  contrast  presented  by  our  Demo- 
cratic Senator  and  Congressmen  who  are  now  addressing  the  people  is 
peculiarly  striking.  The  one,  strong  in  honest  purpose,  and  full  of  ner- 
vous energy,  pressing  the  need  of  this  road,  and  the  duty  of  our  citizens 
toward  the  government ;  the  others  not  deigning  to  give  even  an  explan- 
ation  of  their  view's  and  the  policy  of  thousands  of  our  countrymen  in 
the  East.  Neither  the  views  nor  the  personal  influence  of  our  Lecompton 
delegates  to  the  next  Congress  will  be  of  any  practical  benefit  to  the  road, 
admitting  (which  we  do  not)  that  they  are  its  sincere  and  disinterested 
friends. 

"The  notable  circumstance  that  the  editor  of  The  Tribune  is  endeavour- 
ing to  arouse  the  country  in  behalf  of  a  Pacific  Railroad  immediately  on 
his  arrival  at  the  end  of  his  long  journey,  almost  before  he  has  brushed 
the  dust  of  travel  from  his  garments,  will  carry  greater  weight  with  it  in 
the  East  than  all  Gwin  has  ever  said,  or  can  say,  in  Congress.  It  will  be 
personal  testimony  in  favour  of  the  enterprise  of  the  strongest  kind." 

Mr.  Greeley  spent  about  a  week  among  the  mines  and  miners 
of  El  .Dorado,  Placer,  and  Nevada  counties,  being  the  heart  of 
the  auriferous  region  of  California.  He  devoted  most  of  his 
time  to  the  study  of  mining  operations,  but  made  in  this  region 
as  well  as  elsewhere  a  number  of  Republican  speeches  which 
had  much  to  do  with  giving  the  State  to  Lincoln  in  the  follow- 
ing year.  After  the  gold-region,  the  Yosemite.  His  letter  of 


330  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELET. 

August  1 4,  describes  the  scenes  which  the  genius  of  Bierstadt 
has  also  so  sublimely  illustrated: 

"Descent  into  the  Yosemite  is  only  practicable  at  three  points — one  near 
the  head  of  the  valley,  where  a  small  stream  makes  in  from  the  direction 
of  the  main  ridge  of  the  Sierra,  down  which  there  is  a  trail  from  the 
vicinity  of  Water  River,  Utah — a  trail  practicable,  I  believe,  for  men  on 
foot  only.  The  other  two  lead  in  near  the  outlet,  from  Mariposas  and 
Coulterville  respectively,  on  opposite  banks  of  the  Merced,  and  are  prac- 
ticable for  sure-footed  mules  or  horses.  We,  of  course,  made  our  descent 
by  the  Mariposas  trail,  on  the  south  side  of  tlte  little  river  which  hero 
escapes  from  the  famous  valley  by  a  canon  which  water  alone  can  safely, 
if  at  all,  traverse,  being  shut  in  by  lofty  precipices,  and  broken  by  suc- 
cessive falls. 

"  My  friends  insisted  that  I  should  look  over  the  brink  into  the  profound 
abyss  before  clambering  down  its  side;  but  I,  apprehending  giddiness,  and 
feeling  the  need  of  steady  nerves,  firmly  declined.  So  we  formed  line 
again,  and  moved  on. 

"  The  night  was  clear  and  bright,  as  all  summer  nights  in  this  region 
are ;  the  atmosphere  cool,  but  not  really  cold ;  the  moon  had  risen  before  7 
o'clock,  and  was  shedding  so  much  light  as  to  bother  us  in  our  forest-patht 
where  the  shadow  of  a  standing  pine  looked  exceedingly  like  the  substance 
of  a  fallen  one,  and  many  semblances  were  unreal  and  misleading.  It  was 
often  hard  to  realize  that  the  dark,  narrow  curtain-like  passsge  to  the  left 
was  our  trail,  and  not  the  winding,  broader,  moonlighted-opening  on  the 
right.  The  safest  course  was  to  give  your  horse  a  free  rein,  and  trust  to  his 
sagacity  or  self-love  for  keeping  the  trail.  As  we  descended  by  zigzags 
the  north  face  of  the  all  but  perpendicular  mountain  our  moonlight  soon 
left  us,  or  was  present  only  by  reflection  from  the  opposite  cliff.  Soon,  the 
trail  became  at  once  so  steep,  so  rough,  and  so  tortuous,  that  we  all  dis- 
mounted ;  but  my  attempt  at  walking  proved  a  miserable  failure.  I  had 
been  riding  with  a  bad  Mexican  stirrup,  which  barely  admitted  the  toes  of 
my  left  foot;  and  continual  pressure  on  these  had  sprained  and  swelled 
them,  so  that  walking  was  positive  torture.  I  persevered  in  the  attempt, 
till  my  companions  insisted  on  my  remounting,  and  thus  floundering 
slowly  to  the  bottom.  By  steady  effort,  we  descended  the  three  miles  (four 
thousand  feet  perpendicular)  in  two  hours,  and  stood  at  night  by  the  rush- 
ing, roaring  waters  of  the  Merced. 

"  That  first  full,  deliberate  gaze  up  the  opposite  height!  can  I  ever  forget 
it?  The  valley  is  here  scarcely  half  a  mile  wide,  while  its  northern  wall  of 
mainly  na"ked,  perpendicular  granite  is  at  least  four  thousand  feet  high — 
probably  more.  But  the  modicum  of  moonlight  that  fell  into  this  awful 
gorge  gave  to  that  precipice  a  vagueness  of  outline,  an  indefinite  vastness, 
a  ghostly  and  weird  spirituality.  Had  the  mountain  spoken  to  me  in 
audible  voice,  or  began  to  lean  over  with  the  purpose  of  burying  me 
beneath  its  crushing  mass,  I  should  hardly  have  been  surprised.  Ita 
whiteness,  thrown  into  bold  relief  by  the  patches  of  trees  or  shrubs  which 


THE  YOSEMTTE.  331 

fringed  or  flecked  it  wherever  a  few  handfuls  of  its  moss,  slowly  decom- 
posed to  earth,  could  contrive  to  hold  on,  continually  suggested  the 
presence  of  snow,  which  suggestion,  with  difficulty  refuted,  was  at  once 
renewed.  And,  looking  up  the  valley,  we  saw  just  such  mountain  preci- 
pices, harely  separated  by  intervening  water-courses  (mainly  dry  at  this 
season)  of  inconsiderable  depth,  and  only  receding  sufficiently  to  make 
room  for  a  very  narrow  meadow  inclosing  the  river,  to  the  furthest  limit  of 
vision. 

"We  discussed  the  propriety  of  camping  directly  at  the  foot  of  the  pass, 
but  decided  against  it,  because  of  the  inadequacy  of  the  grass  at  this 
point  for  our  tired,  hungry  beasts,  and  resolved  to  push  on  to  the  nearest 
of  the  two  houses  in  the  valley,  which  was  said  to  be  four  miles  distant. 
To  my  dying  day,  I  shall  remember  that  weary,  interminable  ride  up  the 
valley.  We  had  been  on  foot  since  daylight;  it  was  now  past  midnight; 
all  were  nearly  used  up,  and  I  in  torture  from  over  twelve  hours'  steady 
riding  on  the  hardest  trotting  horse  in  America.  Yet  we  pressed  on,  and 
on,  through  clumps  of  trees,  and  bits  of  forest,  and  patches  of  meadow, 
and  over  hillocks  of  mountain  debris,  mainly  granite  bowlders  of  every 
size,  often  nearly  as  round  as  cannon  balls,  forming  all  but  perpendicular 
banks  to  the  capricious  torrent  that  brought  them  hither — those  stupen- 
dous precipices  on  either  side  glaring  down  upon  us  all  the  while.  How 
many  times  our  heavy  eyes — I  mean  those  of  my  San  Francisco  friend  and 
my  own — were  lighted  up  by  visions  of  that  intensely  desired  cabin — vis- 
ions which  seemed  distinct  and  unmistakable,  but,  which,  alas !  a  nearer 
view  proved  to  be  made  up  of  moonlight  and  shadow,  rock  and  trees,  into 
which  they  faded  one  after  another.  It  seemed  at  length  that  we  should 
never  reach  the  cabin;  and  my  wavering  mind  recalled  elfish  German 
stories  of  the  Wild  Huntsman,  and  of  men  who,  having  accepted  invita- 
tions to  a  midnight  chase,  found  on  their  return  that  said  chase  had  been 
prolonged  till  all  their  relatives  and  friends  were  dead,  and  no  one  could 
be  induced  to  recognize  or  recollect  them.  Gladly  could  I  have  thrown 
myself  recklessly  from  the  saddle,  and  lain  where  I  fell  till  morning,  but 
this  would  never  answer,  and  we  kept  steadily  on. 

4  Time  and  the  hour  wear  out  the  longest  day.' 

"At  length  the  real  cabin-+-one  made  of  posts  and  beams,  and  whip- 
sawed  boards,  instead  of  rock,  and  shadow,  and  moonshine — was  reached, 
and  we  all  eagerly  dismounted,  turning  out  our  weary  steeds  into  abun- 
dant grass,  and  stirring  up  the  astonished  landlord,  who  had  never  before 
received  guests  at  that  unseemly  hour.  (It  was  after  one  A.  M.)  He 
made  us  welcome,  however,  to  his  best  accommodations,  which  would 
have  found  us  lenient  critics  even  if  they  had  been  worse ;  and  I  crept  into 
my  rude  but  clean  bed  so  soon  as  possible,  while  the  rest  awaited  the  prep- 
aration of  some  refreshment  for  the  inner  man.  There  was  never  a  dainty 
that  could  have  tempted  me  to  eat  at  that  hour.  I  am  told  that  none  ever 
before  travelled  from  Bear  Valley  to  the  Yosemite  in  one  day — I  am  con- 
fident no  green-horns  ever  did.  The  distance  can  hardly  exceed  thirty 


332  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELEr. 

miles  by  an  airline;  but  only  a  bird  could  traverse  that  line,  while,  by 
way  of  Mariposas  and  the  South  Fork,  it  must  be  fully  sixty  miles,  with  a 
rise  and  fall  of  not  less  than  twenty  thousand  feet. 

"  The  fall  of  the  Yoseruite,  so  called,  is  a  humbug.  It  is  not  the  Merced 
River  that  makes  this  fall,  but  a  mere  tributary  trout-brook,  which  pitches 
in  from  the  north  by  a  barely  once-broken  descent  of  two  thousand  six 
hundred  feet,  while  the  Merced  enters  the  valley  at  its  eastern  extremity, 
over  falls  of  six  hundred  and  two  hundred  and  fifty  feet.  But  a  river  thrice 
as  large  as  the  Merced,  at  this  season,  would  be  utterly  dwarfed  by  all  the 
other  accessories  of  this  prodigious  chasm.  Only  a  Mississippi  or  a 
Niagara  could  be  adequate  to  their  exactions.  I  readily  concede  that  a 
hundred  times  the  present  amount  of  water  may  roll  down  the  Yosemite 
fall  in  the  months  of  May  and  June,  when  the  SM;>\VS  are  melting  from  the 
central  ranges  of  the  Sierra  Nevada,  which  bound  this  abyss  on  the  east; 
but  this  would  not  add  a  fraction  to  the  wonder  of  this  vivid  exemplifica- 
tion of  the  divine  power  and  majesty.  At  present,  the  little  stream  that 
leaps  down  the  Yosemite,  and  is  all  but  shattered  to  mist  by  the  amazing 
descent,  looks  like  a  tape-line  let  down  from  the  cloud-tapped  height  to 
measure  the  depth  of  the  abyss.  The  Yosemite  Valley  (or  Gorge)  is  the 
most  unique  and  majestic  of  nature's  man-els,  but  the  Yosemite  Fall  is  of 
little  account.  Were  it  absent,  the  valley  would  not  be  perccptibty  less 
worthy  of  a  fatiguing  visit. 

"  We  traversed  the  valley  from  end  to  end  next  day,  but  an  accumula- 
tion of  details  on  such  a  subject  only  serves  to  confuse  and  blunt  the 
observer's  powers  of  perception  and  appreciation.  Perhaps  the  visitor 
who  should  be  content  with  a  long  look  into  the  abyss  from  the  most  con- 
venient height,  without  braving  the  toil  of  a  descent  would  be  wiser  than 
all  of  us;  and  yet  that  first  glance  upward  from  the  foot  will  long  haunt 
me  as  more  impressive  than  any  look  downward  from  the  summit  could  be. 

"  I  shall  not  multiply  details,  nor  waste  paper  in  noting  all  the  foolish 
names  which  foolish  people  have  given  to  different  peaks  or  turrets.  Just 
think  of  two  giant-stone  towers,  or  pillars,  which  rise  a  thousand  feet 
above  the  towering  cliff  which  form  their  base,  being  styled  'The  Two 
Sisters!'  Could  anything  be  more  maladroit  and  lackadaisical?  'The 
Dome'  is  a  high,  round  naked  peak,  which  rises  between  the  Merced  and 
its  little  tributary  from  the  inmost  recesses  of  the  Sierra  Nevada  already 
instanced,  and  which  towers  to  an  altitude  of  over  five  thousand  feet  above 
the  waters  at  its  base.  Picture  to  yourself  a  perpendicular  wall  of  bare 
granite  nearly  or  quite  one  mile  high!  Yet  there  are  some  dozen  or  score 
of  peaks  in  all,  ranging  from  three  thousand  to  five  thousand  feet  above 
the  valley;  and  a  biscuit  tossed  from  any  of  them  would  strike  very  near 
its  base,  and  its  fragments  go  bounding  and  falling  still  further.  I  certainly 
miss  here  the  glaciers  of  Chamonix;  but  I  know  no  single  wonder  of 
nature  on  earth  which  can  claim  a  superiority  over  the  Yosemite.  Just 
dream  yourself  for  one  hour  in  a  chasm  nearly  ten  miles  long,  with  egress 
save  for  birds  and  water,  but  at  three  points,  up  the  face  of  the  precipices 
from  three  thousand  to  four  thousand  feet  high,  the  chasm  scarcely  more 


BAN   FRANCISCO.  333 

than  a  mile  wide  at  any  point,  and  tapering  to  a  mere  gorge,  or  canon  at 
cither  end,  with  walla  of  mainly  naked  and  perpendicular  white  granite, 
from  three  thousand  to  five  thousand  feet  high,  so  that  looking  up  to  the 
sky  from  it,  is  like  looking  out  of  an  unfathomable  profound — and  you 
will  have  some  conception  of  the  Yosemite." 

After  visiting  the  Yosemite,  Mr.  Greeley  remitted  nothing 
of  his  busy  life.  He  visited  the  country  of  "the  big  trees," 
Colonel  Fremont's  mines,  Marys ville,  and  other  portions  of 
California,  taking  careful  notes  of  the  resources  of  the  State, 
delivering  political  and  agricultural  addresses,  and  "  making 
himself  generally  useful."  He  arrived  at  San  Francisco  —  the 
Golden  Gate  —  about  the  middle  of  August,  and  was  received 
with  the  utmost  hospitality.  The  guest  of  the  city,  he  deliv- 
ered addresses  to  institutes,  schools,  the  public.  There  was  a 
Pacific  Railroad  meeting  in  his  honour,  of  which  The  Bulletin 
newspaper  gave  the  following  account: 

"The  Grand  Pacific  Railroad  mass  meeting,  which  took  place  on  the 
evening  of  17th  August,  in  front  of  the  Oriental,  on  the  occasion  of  the 
public  appearance  in  San  Francisco  of  the  Hon.  Horace  Greeley,  was  an 
imposing  demonstration,  and  in  all  respects  a  decided  success.  By  7J£ 
o'clock  the  people  had  collected  in«vast  numbers,  and  the  plaza  and  street 
in  front  of  the  hotel  were  crowded.  There  must  have  been,  at  a  fair  com- 
putation, five  thousand  people  present,  and  all  manifested  much  interest 
in  the  great  object  for  which  the  meeting  was  called,  and  in  the  man  who 
was  to  address  them. 

"The  Oriental  Hotel  was  brilliantly  illuminated  for  the  occasion 
Between  the  pillars  of  the  veranda  were  hung  many  Japanese  lanterns, 
and  the  balustrades  were  filled  with  lamps.  As  it  was  known  many  ladies 
would  be  present,  seats  were  placed  on  the  balcony  for  them ;  and  long 
before  the  speaking  commenced,  these  and  the  windows  and  rooms  open- 
ing upon  them  were  filled. 

"At  8  o'clock  Ira  P.  Rankin  stepped  forward  upon  the  platform  and 
nominated  a  president  and  officers  of  the  meeting. 

"As  soon  as  the  meeting  was  organized,  Mr.  Greeley  made  his  appear, 
ance  upon  the  stand  which  had  been  erected  in  front  of  the  hotel,  and  was 
raised  about  six  feet  above  the  street.  His  appearance  was  greeted  with 
prolonged  cheers.  Colonel  Crockett  stepped  forward  for  the  purpose  of 
introducing  the  speaker;  but  the  crowd  was  so  anxious  to  see  and  hear 
Mr.  Greeley,  that  for  a  few  minutes  he  could  not  be  heard.  The  more 
distant  portions  of  the  assembly  cried,  'We  cannot  see  Mr.  Greeley,'  'Take 
the  balcony,'  '  We  want  to  see  him.'  Colonel  Crockett  replied  that  Mr. 
Greeley  protested  that  he  could  not  be  heard  from  the  balcony.  The  crowd 
Bcmed  determined  that  they  would  see  the  speaker,  and  hurrahed  and 


834  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GEEELET. 

vociferated  until  the  president  stated  that  Mr.  Greeley  would  compromise 
by  standing  on  the  table.  At  this  proposition  there  was  great  applause, 
and  order  being  restored,  after  a  few  words  of  introduction  by  the  presi 
dent  of  the  meeting,  Mr.  Greeley  mounted  the  table  and  stood  up  before 
the  people,  at  which  there  was  again  hearty  and  repeated  cheers.  Several 
firemen's  torches  were  so  disposed  on  the  stand  as  to  throw  their  light 
upon  him. 

"  The  personal  appearance  of  Mr.  Greeley  is  familiar  to  many  of  our 
readers.  He  is  above  the  medium  height,  rather  thin,  and  has  a  slight 
stoop.  His  head  is  bald,  with  the  exception  of  light  flaxen  locks  at  the 
sides  and  back.  Though  nearly  fifty  years  of  age,  there  are  no  wrinkles 
in  his  face;  on  the  contrary,  his  features,  except  for  his  baldness,  would 
indicate  quite  a  young  man.  There  is  a  peculiar  brightness  in  his  eyes, 
and  the  general  expression  of  his  face  is  mildness  and  benignity.  His 
dress,  last  evening,  after  drawing  off  his  drab  overcoat  (from  which  the 
mountaineers  cut  off  all  the  buttons),  was  plain  black  with  a  light  neck- 
cloth. The  famous  white  hat  had  been  exchanged  for  one  of  dun-colored 
wool.  His  late  journey  across  the  plains,  although  it  fatigued  him  much, 
lias  made  him  weigh  more  than  ordinarily,  and  has  given  him  a  fresh  and 
hale  appearance." 

The  speech  which  Mr.  Greeley  delivered  "from  the  table" 
IB  described  by  the  journals  as  one  of  great  power  and  real  elo- 
quence. His  address  before  the  Mechanics'  Institute  was 
profoundly  thoughtful.  He  insisted  that  Labour,  in  order  to 
accomplish  its  true  and  sublime  destiny,  must  be  educated. 
"  The  new  idea  of  our  time,"  he  said  "  is  founded  upon  a  better 
understanding  of  the  law  of  God  and  humanity.  It  recognizes 
all  useful  labour  as  essentially  laudable  and  honourable, —  the 
greater  honour  where  there  is  the  greater  proficiency.  The 
digger  who  makes  the  thousandth  part  of  a  canal  is  not  of 
honour  equal  to  the  scientific  engineer  who  fully  accomplishes 
the  work  of  its  construction.  More  honour  with  greater  intel- 
ligence, but  honour  to  each  in  his  degree,  but  the  larger 
honour  is  due  to  him  who  accomplishes  the  greater  result. 
Simple  manual  labour  can  never  achieve  the  highest  reward, 
nor  command  the  greatest  regard.  Hand  and  head  must 
work  together.  To  accomplish  great  results  the  labourer 
must  be  intelligent  and  educated.  In  this  country,  the  price 
of  labour  is  comparatively  high,  and  yet  it  is  a  question 
whether  it  is  not,  on  the  whole,  cheaper  in  the  end  than  else- 
where. Nicholas  Biddle,  and  other  distinguished  thinkers 


JOHN   BROWN.  335 

npon  the  subject,  asserted  that  American  labour  at  a  higher 
price  was  cheaper  than  the  labour  of  Spain  or  most  other 
countries  at  almost  nominal  rates.  In  building  the  bed  of  a 
railroad,  for  instance,  it  is  found  cheaper  with  American  labour, 
or  labour  under  their  guidance  and  direction,  than  with  any- 
other.  This  is  proved  by  the  fact  that  railroads  can  be  built 
in  America  at  one-sixth  part  of  the  cost  of  constructing  them 
in  Italy,  and  I  believe,  in  Ireland  also.  Labour,  as  it  becomes 
better  educated,  will  also  become  more  effective,  and  when  it 
receives  its  double  reward,  it  will  be  more  profitable." 

Mr.  Greeley  returned  to  New-York  by  way  of  Panama.  His 
letters  from  California  to  The  Tribune  had  created  renewed 
interest  in  that  wonderful  portion  of  our  republic,  but  after 
his  return  he  wrote  still  another,  which  was  an  unanswerable 
summing  up  of  the  arguments  in  behalf  of  a  Pacific  Railroad. 
The  letter  concluded: 

"  Men  and  brethren !  let  us  resolve  to  have  a  railroad  to  the  Pacific  —  to 
have  it  soon.  It  will  add  more  to  the  strength  and  wealth  of  our  country 
than  would  the  aquisition  of  a  dozen  Cubas.  It  will  prove  a  bond  of  union 
not  easily  broken,  and  a  new  spring  to  our  national  industry,  prosperity, 
and  wealth.  It  will  call  new  manufactures  into  existence,  and  increase 
the  demand  for  the  products  of  those  already  existing.  It  will  open  new 
vistas  to  national  and  to  individual  aspiration,  and  crush  out  filibusterism 
by  giving  a  new  and  wholesome  direction  to  the  public  mind.  My  long, 
fatiguing  journey  was  undertaken  in  the  hope  that  I  might  do  something 
toward  the  early  construction  of  the  Pacific  Railroad ;  and  I  trust  that  it 
has  not  been  made  whollv  in  vain." 

Had  Mr.  Greeley  not  visited  California,  the  Pacific  Railroad 
would  have  been  built;  not,  indeed,  so  soon  as  it  was.  Per- 
haps he  would  have  been  gathered  to  his  fathers  before  the 
success  of  the  enterprise;  but  sooner  or  later  its  success  was 
inevitable.  He  hastened  its  construction  by  many  years. 
This  is  the  praise  to  which  he  is  entitled  in  this  regard;  no 
more,  no  less.  It  is  precisely  the  same  with  every  reformer. 
He  anticipates  great  events,  hastens  them,  does  not  create 
them.  This  latter  is  the  work  of  God  and  the  people. 

Mr.  Greeley  had  about  rested  from  his  journeyings  when  an 
event  occurred  which  aroused  the  nation.  This  was  the  capture 
of  Harper's  Ferry,  Virginia,  by  John  Brown,  aided  by  a  few 


336 


LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELET. 


men  and  pikes.  The  incident  has  been  related  with  historic 
fulness  and  need  not  be  here  enlarged  upon.  Mr.  Greeley  was 
among  those  who  were  not  alarmed  on  account  of  this  unex- 
pected event.  He  deemed  the  attempt  of  John  Brown  to  free 
the  slaves  of  Virginia  ill  advised  and  rash,  but  he  honoured 
the  grand  old  man's  motives,  and  paid  respectful  deference  to 
his  intense  hatred  of  slavery  and  of  all  injustice.  Years  of 
reflection  served  only  to  increase  his  admiration  of  the  man 
who  so  rashly  undertook  a  sublime  work  of  emancipation,  who 
so  heroically  died  because  of  unfortunate  failure;  and,  perhaps, 
the  finest  chapter  of  "  The  American  Conflict "  is  the  chapter 
upon  "John  Brown."  To  no  other  name  among  men  is  a 
chapter  of  that  historical  work  devoted. 


GENERAL  EDWARD   D.  15AKER.— See  page  309. 


CHAPTER   XIX. 

THE  QUADRILATERAL  CAMPAIGN  OF  1860. 

The  Division  of  Parties  in  1860 — Rupture  of  the  Democratic  National 
Convention  at  Charleston,  South  Carolina — The  Chicago  Convention 
—  Popular  Enthusiasm  —  Mr.  Greeley  a  Delegate  from  Oregon  —  Sup- 
ports  Edward  Bates  for  President — He  Defeats  Mr.  Seward's  Nomina- 
tion— "Greeley  at  the  Tremont,  Weed  at  the  Richmond  House"  —  Mr. 
Weed's  Chagrin — Eminent  Men  of  the  Convention:  Thomas  Corwin; 
David  Wilmot;  William  M.  Evarts;  Joshua  R.  Giddings;  Carl  Schurz; 
John  A.  Andrew;  Cassius  M.  Clay;  and  others — The  Imbroglio  Among 
New- York  Politicians  —  Mr.  Raymond,  from  Auburn,  Assails  Mr. 
Greeley — The  Famous  Letter  Dissolving  the  Firm  of  "Seward,  Weed 
and  Greeley"  —  Mr.  Weed's  Wisdom — Two  Democratic  Tickets  Norn- 
inated  — The  "Bell-Everett"  Ticket— The  Candidates— The  Cam. 
paign  —  Success. 

THE  political  campaign  of  I860  was  remarkable  on  many 
accounts,  and  especially  in  this,  that  there  were  no  less  than 
four  regularly  nominated  tickets  before  the  people,  each  con- 
taining candidates  for  President  and  Vice-President,  and  each 
claiming  to  be  representative  of  a  national  organization,  or  of 
ideas  which  ought  to  be  maintained  by  organized  eifort  in  all 
parts  of  the  republic. 

The  Democratic  party,  being  in  power,  met  in  regular  con- 
vention of  delegates  at  the  city  of  Charleston,  South  Carolina, 
in  the  latter  part  of  April.  Events  to  which  reference  has 
already  been  made  as  causing  a  wide  difference  of  opinion  in 
the  party  upon  the  issue  of  paramount  interest,  reached  their 
logical  conclusion  at  Charleston  in  an  open  rupture.  Delegates 
from  several  of  the  States  withdrew  from  the  convention,  set 
up  a  seceding  body  of  their  own,  and  adjourned  to  meet  at 
Richmond,  Virginia,  on  the  llth  of  June  following.  The 
remaining  delegates,  belonging  mainly  to  the  "Douglas  wing" 
of  the  party,  having  authorized  a  call  to  the  States  of  the 
seceding  delegates  for  new  delegations,  adjourned  to  meet  at 
Baltimore,  June  18.  00 


338  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GKEELEY. 

Shortly  after  tliis  schism,  and  in  the  midst  of  Democratic 
confusion  worse  confounded,  the  National  Convention  of  the 
Republicans  met  in  an  immense  wigwam  prepared  for  the  pur- 
pose in  the  city  of  Chicago.  There  surely  never  has  been  a 
party  national  convention  held  in  our  country  amid  such 
popular  enthusiasm  as  that  which  met  the  delegates  on  their 
arrival  at  Chicago,  surrounded  them  during  their  whole  stay 
in  the  city,  and  accompanied  them  to  their  homes.  The  build- 
ing of  the  great  "  wigwam  "  had  been  the  subject  of  many 
telegrams  and  letters  sent  all  over  the  country,  which  created 
a  popular  interest  to  see  it.  It  was  at  the  time  when  the  grade 
of  the  city  was  being  changed,  and  immense  buildings  were 
being  raised  several  feet  higher  than  their  original  founda- 
tions. Thousands  took  advantage  of  the  occasion  and  the 
temporary  cheap  fares  to  visit  the  city.  The  "  outside  attend- 
ance "  was  simply  immense.  Not  the  Coliseum  at  Rome  could 
have  given  standing-room  to  the  visitors  within  and  around 
the  famous  "  wigwam,"  during  the  sessions  of  this  conven- 
tion. 

Among  the  delegates  were  many  men  of  distinguished 
name, — statesmen,  authors,  journalists,  politicians, — but  un- 
questionably the  observed  of  all  observers  was  Horace  Greeley. 
He  was  a  delegate  from  Oregon.  Not  in  popular  favour,  but 
in  political  importance  and  ceaseless  activity,  the  man  who 
stood  next  to  Mr.  Greeley  in  this  great  gathering  of  repre- 
sentative men  was  ThurlowWeed.  It  did  not  take  the  curious 
long  to  discover  that  Mr.  Greeley  was  at  the  Tremont  House, 
Mr.  Weed  at  the  Richmond.  Indeed,  there  were  placards  con- 
spicuously posted  saying:  "  Greeley  at  the  Tremont,  Weed  at 
the  Richmond  House."  From  those  headquarters  emanated 
the  finest  strategy  and  grandest  contest  ever  witnessed  on  any 
American  theatre  of  political  war. 

Mr.  Greeley  was  for  the  nomination  of  Edward  Bates,  of 
Missouri,  subsequently  Attorney-General  of  the  United  States. 
He  afterwards  stated  his  reasons  for  this  preference  in  these 
words: 

"  My  choice  was  Edward  Bates,  of  St.  Louis.  He  had  been  sole  Repre. 
sentative  of  Missouri  in  Congress  fully  thirty  years  before,  when  lie  had 


DR.    CHARLES  H.    RAT.  339 

heartily  supported  the  administration  of  John  Quincy  Adams.  He  had 
since  been  mainly  in  retirement,  save  that  he  had  presided  with  eminent 
ability  over  the  River  and  Harbour  Convention  held  at  Chicago  in  1847, 
and  had  held  a  local  judgeship.  Born  in  Virginia,  a  life-long  slaveholder, 
in  politics  a  Whig,  he  was  thoroughly  conservative,  and  so  held  fast  to  the 
doctrine  of  our  Revolutionary  sages,  that  Slavery  was  an  evil  to  be 
restricted,  not  a  good  to  be  diffused.  This  conviction  made  him  essen- 
tially  a  Republican ;  while  I  believed  that  he  could  poll  votes  in  every 
Slave  State,  and,  if  elected,  rally  all  that  was  left  of  the  Whig  party  therein 
to  resist  Secession  and  Rebellion.  If  not  the  only  Republican  whose  elec- 
tion would  not  suffice  as  a  pretext  for  civil  war,  he  seemed  to  me  that  one 
most  likely  to  repress  the  threatened  insurrection,  or,  at  the  worst  to  crush 
it.  I  did  not  hesitate  to  avow  my  preference,  though  I  may  have  withheld 
some  of  my  reasons  for  it." l 

Mr.  Seward  was  the  strongest  candidate  at  the  beginning, 
and  many  believed  he  would  be  nominated  on  the  first  ballot. 
But  Abraham  Lincoln  had  many  friends  among  the  delegates. 
They  were  enthusiastic,  straight-forward,  aggressive,  and  un- 
purchasable.  They  were  sustained  by  an  immense,  omnipres- 
ent outside  pressure,  and  powerfully  strengthened  by  The 
Chicago  Tribune,  then  and  since  one  of  the  strongest  journals 
in  the  republic,  at  this  time  edited  by  Dr.  Charles  H.  Ray,  the 
ablest  and  most  accomplished  journalist  of  the  West,  with 
whom  was  associated  Mr.  Joseph  Medill,  since  the  distin- 
guished reformer  of  the  law  of  elections,  and  Mayor  of  Chi- 
cago. Salmon  P.  Chase,  of  Ohio,  had  considerable  strength, 
and  Simon  Cameron,  of  Pennsylvania,  received  the  support  of 
not  quite  the  whole  delegation  from  his  State,  and  had  a  very 
few  friends  from  other  States.  These,  with  Judge  Bates,  Judge 
McLean,  and  others,  had  a  majority  of  the  delegates.  There 
was  not  the  remotest  possibility  of  nominating  Judge  Bates. 
But  Mr.  Greeley  clung  to  him  with  unyielding  pertinacity. 
He  visited,  by  invitation,  a  number  of  State  delegations, 
addressing  them  in  behalf  of  his  favourite.  Those  addresses 
were  marvels  of  diplomacy  and  political  sagacity.  No  unkind 
word  toward  Mr.  Seward  escaped  him;  many  sentences  of 
praise  of  that  statesman  fell  from  his  lips.  Nevertheless,  he 
was  killing  Seward  all  the  time,  and  with  the  only  means 
which  it  was  possible  effectively  to  use. 

1  Recollections  or  a  Busy  Life,  p.  389. 


340  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

Had  Mr.  Greeley  wavered  for  an  instant  in  his  support  of 
Mr.  Bates,  or  been  goaded  into  the  expression  of  any  ill  opin- 
ion of  Mr.  Seward,  Mr.  Lincoln,  or  the  other  candidates,  Mr. 
Weed  would  have  won  the  game.  He  gave  hope  and  encour- 
agement to  all,  and  it  was  impossible  for  Mr.  Weed  to  bring 
about  any  desertions.  Weed  remained  nearly  all  the  time  in  his 
own  rooms,  but  knowing  everything  that  was  going  on  in 
every  delegation  in  the  city.  His  devoted  friends,  the  devoted 
friends  of  Mr.  Seward,  used  every  argument,  resorted  to  every 
means,  to  bring  about  their  desired  result.  On  the  night 
before  the  ballot,  they  had  a  grand  "  Seward  demonstration," — 
processions  with  banners,  music,  torch-lights;  addresses;  all 
possible  appliances  to  overcome  the  tremendous  outside  pres- 
sure and  "  the  influence  of  The  Chicago  Tribune "  for  Mr. 
Lincoln. 

Eight  here,  perhaps,  was  where  Mr.  Greeley  manifested  his 
greatest  power  and  skill  in  political  management.  The  demon- 
stration had  been  gotten  up  utterly  "  regardless  of  expense." 
New-York  merchants  contributed  with  princely  liberality,  and 
were  generously  seconded  by  the  Seward  delegates  and  their 
friends  in  the  Garden  City.  It  was  an  imposing  affair;  a 
magnificent  demonstration.  It  was  imposing  in  more  respects 
than  one.  It  imposed  upon  the  Seward  men.  They  were  fairly 
wild  with  excitement.  It  was,  perhaps,  the  only  time  in  his 
life  when  Thurlow  Weed  was  greatly  deceived.  There  was  a 
world  of  reality  in  this  splendid  display,  this  sublime  outpour- 
ing ol  enthusiasm.  There  was  also  a  world  of  sham  in  it. 
Dr.  Ray,  who  was  never  deceived  by  any  sham,  great  or  small, 
privately  pooh-poohed  it.  "  Why,"  said  he,  "  Chicago  can  get 
up  that  sort  of  thing  any  time  with  five  thousand  dollars  sub- 
scribed." While  the  Seward  men  were  demonstrating,  the 
Lincoln  men  especially  were  hard  at  work,  and  went  to  bed 
rather  late  the  next  morning — those  who  went  to  bed  at  all — 
confident  of  success;  but  willing,  indeed  anxious,  to  have  Mr. 

'reed  and  his  advisers,  errand-  and  minute-men  suppose  that 
Mr.  Seward  would  now  go  through  with  a  rush.  Col.  Webb 
and  Mr.  Raymond  telegraphed  to  their  respective  journals  the 
sure  success  of  Mr.  Seward.  And  Horace  Greeley  did  like- 


WILLIAM  H.  SEWARR 


MB.  GKEELEY  AT  CHICAGO.  341 

wise!  When  a  Seward  man  of  prominence  proposed  to  Mr. 
Greeley  to  suggest  a  person  who  would  be  satisfactory  to  him 
for  Vice-President,  he  said,  "O,  never  mind;  fix  up  the  whole 
ticket  to  suit  yourselves."  It  is  highly  probable  that  Mr. 
Weed  would  have  succeeded  in  procuring  the  nomination  of 
his  friend  but  for  the  mistaken  estimate  of  his  strength  formed 
upon  the  great  demonstration  of  this  beautiful  Thursday  nigl 
It  seems  hardly  possible  that  Mr.  Greeley,  in  constant  am. 
confidential  intercourse  with  Western  men  who  estimated  the 
whole  thing  at  its  proper  worth,  could  have  been  for  a  moment 
deceived  by  it.  If  Thurlow  Weed  had  not  met  his  match  in 
Horace  Greeley,  he  had  met  it  in  Horace  Greeley,  backed  by 
the  best  minds,  the  most  skilful  politicians,  and  the  most 
powerful  and  dauntless  public  journal,  of  the  Northwest.3 

The  result  is  well  remembered  by  all.  Mr.  Seward  failed  by 
sixty  votes  to  receive  a  majority  on  the  first  ballot,  and  after 
that  there  was  not  a  shadow  of  a  chance  for  him.  Abraham 
Lincoln  was  nominated  on  the  third  ballot  amid  a  scene  of 
enthusiastic  excitement  which  a  similar  event  has  never  pro- 
duced before  or  since.  The  vast  wigwam,  packed  Math  men 
and  women,  might  almost  have  -had  its  roof  blown  up  by  the 
concussion  of  the  cheers.  The  thousands  outside,  nearly  all 
Lincoln  men,  were  frantic  with  joy.  Cannons  were  fired  from 
the  neighbourhood,  the  very  smoke  of  which  penetrated  the 
wigwam,  and  brought  out  more  cheers.  It  was  a  long  time 
before  order  could  be  restored;  not,  in  fact,  it  might  seem, 
until  the  very  throats  of  the  people  could  for  the  time  being 
be  used  no  more. 

*  I  think  I  am  not  mistaken  in  thus  representing  Mr.  Greeley  as  allow- 
ing Mr.  Weed  to  deceive  himself,  and  most  adroitly  helping  him  in  that 
hehalf.  I  was  present  in  the  Convention — sitting  near  Col.  Webb,  of  The 
Courier  and  Enquirer — during  all  of  its  sittings,  and  at  the  Tremont  House 
the  rest  of  the  time.  I  was  in  constant  communication  with  Henry  8. 
Lane,  of  Indiana,  Governor  Kirkwood,  of  Iowa,  and  other  strong  friends  of 
Lincoln  in  the  West.  When,  on  the  night  of  the  demonstration,  Col. 
Webb  sent  word  to  his  paper  that  Mr.  Seward  would  be  nominated,  I  sent 
word  to  the  country  journal  for  which  I  was  corresponding  that  Mr.  Lin- 
coln would  be  nominated.  Horace  Greeley  knew  more  than  I  did.  But 
.f  I  had  been  he,  I  should  have  said  "  it  looks  like  the  game  is  up  "  too. 
'Jilaia  Uio  Seward  men  quit  work  too  soon. 


34:2  J.TFK   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

It  is  cieditable  to  Mr.  Weed  to  say  that  lie  felt  deeply  pained 
and  chagrined  at  the  defeat  of  Mr.  Seward.  It  was  said  at 
the  time  that  when  the  result  was  announced  to  him  at  his 
apartments  he  was  observed  to  shed  tears.  Whether  this  be 
so  or  not,  it  is  certain  that  his  long,  ever  faithful  devotion  to 
Mr.  Seward  must  be  regarded  as  making  a  beautiful  relief  in 
the  almost  universal  selfishness  of  our  politicians'  careers. 
Nor  is  it  unreasonable  to  conclude  that  he  who  inspired  such 
friendship  on  the  part  of  a  mind  so  acute,  so  observant,  so 
comprehensive,  must  have  been  possessed  of  much  more  than 
usual  personal  nobility  of  character  as  well  as  genuine  great- 
ness. 

Mr.  Greeley  met  at  the  Chicago  Convention  many  men  of 
distinguished  reputation  then  and  since.  Thomas  Corwin  was 
there,  aged  indeed,  and  in  feeble  health,  but  with  mind  as  clear 
and  strong  as  when  he  spoke  as  rarely  man  has  spoken  "for 
Tippecanoe  and  Tyler  too."  David  Wilmot,  the  author  of  the 
famous  anti-slavery  proviso,  was  temporary  chairman  of  the 
Convention.  William  M.  Evarts,  since  greatly  celebrated,  here 
first  won  national  renown.  He  was  a  devoted  friend  of  Mr. 
Seward,  and  chairman  of  the  New  York  delegation.  His  speech, 
on  seconding  the  motion  to  make  the  nomination  of  Mr.  Lincoln 
unanimous,  was  surpassingly  eloquent.  With  touching,  manly, 
dignified  words,  he  announced  his  own  sorrow  and  that  of  the 
delegates  of  the  great  State  of  New  York,  over  the  defeat  of 
their  beloved  statesman,  and  then  with  a  discriminating  yet 
generous  eulogium  upon  Mr.  Lincoln,  and  with  a  courtesy 
scarcely  less  than  sublime,  seconded,  in  the  name  of  New  York, 
the  motion  of  unanimous  nomination.  Here,  too,  was  the 
venerable  Joshua  R  Giddings,  whose  long  anti-slavery  record 
had  made  him  a  general  favourite,  so  that  he  could  not  appear 
on  the  stage  without  being  greeted  with  a  storm  of  applause. 
Carl  Schurz,  our  most  eloquent  philosophical  orator,  laboured 
earnestly  and  well  for  Mr.  Seward,  but  yielded  to  defeat  with 
abundant  magnanimity.  His  speech  in  seconding  the  motion 
to  make  the  nomination  unanimous,  was  surpassed  only  by 
that  of  Mr.  Evarts,  if  surpassed  at  all.  The  Hon  John  A. 
Andrew,  of  Massachusetts,  made  a  most  favourable  impression 


"  SEWARD,  WKED,  AND  GRKKOT."  843 

in  the  Convention  and  upon  Western  people,  which  was  more 
than  borne  out  by  his  subsequent  usefulness  and  eminence  in 
the  old  Bay  State.  Cassius  M.  Clay,  of  Kentucky,  was  a  dele- 
gate, but  being  named  as  a  candidate  for  Yice-President,  did 
not  attend  the  sittings  of  the  Convention.  Henry  S.  Lane,  of 
Indiana,  who  had  presided  at  Philadelphia  four  years  before^ 
was  now  a  delegate,  labouring  night  and  day  for  Mr.  Lincoln's 
nomination.  He  was  powerfully  aided  by  Caleb  B.  Smith, 
afterwards  Secretary  of  the  Interior,  always  an  eloquent  speaker, 
with  a  lisp  rather  pleasant  than  otherwise.  O.  II.  Browning, 
of  Illinois,  also  afterwards  Secretary  of  the  Interior,  stood  at 
the  head  of  the  Illinois  delegation,  and,  overwhelmed  by  feel- 
ings of  gratification,  made  the  only  poor  speech  of  his  life  in 
acknowledgement  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  nomination.  Montgomery 
Blair,  subsequently  Postmaster  General,  was  a  quiet  but  influ- 
ential member  ol  the  Convention.  Among  these  and  other 
magnates  of  the  Republican  party,  delegates  to  the  Convention 
or  lookers-on  ir  Venice,  Mr.  Greeley  was  preeminent  in  influ- 
ence and  popularity.  It  was  conceded  that  he  had  defeated  Mr. 
Sewa.'i's  nomination. 

Indeed  this  fact  led  to  a  controversy,  which  caused  much 
comment,  ?nd  brought  out  the  publication  of  the  famous  letter 
from  Mr.  Greeley  to  Mr.  Seward,  by  which  the  former  gave 
notice  of  his  retirement  from  the  firm  of  "  Seward,  Weed  and 
Greeley.''  Col.  Webb,  of  the  Courier  and  Enquirer,  and  Mr. 
Raymond  of  The  New-York  Times,  were  ^nyHe  to  preserve 
that  serene  composure  in  defeat  which  more  '.-n  '^ly  than  almost 
anything  else  characterizes  greatness  of  sou1..  Any  one  should 
be  able  to  stand  a  victory;  but  a  great  mL*.-.  will  manifest  no 
unseemly  agitation  in  the  midst  of  even  the  most  unexpected 
disaster.  Profoundly  sorrowful  he  may  be,  ought  to  be,  for 
the  irisfortunes  of  a  friend;  never  spiteful  that  he  has  been 
worstad  in  a  conflict  where  no  wrong  means  were  used  to  bring 
victory  to  the  opposing  side. 

After  the  convention,  Mr.  Raymond  and  Col.  Webb  kept  up 
a  ne//spaper  war  on  Mr.  Creeley,  fitributing  to  him  gross 
duplicity  at  Chicago.  Viri -1''  ~  Mr.  Seward  at  his  home  in 
Auburn,  socn  affrr  the  3  •  ./  •'Y.oii,  Mr.  Raymond  thence  wrote 


34:4  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELET. 

a  letter  to  The  Times,  in  which  he  acknowledged  that  Mr. 
Greeley  had  been  the  means  of  defeating  Mr.  Seward,  and 
attributed  to  him  unworthy  motives.  The  more  important 
portions  of  this  letter  follow: 

"  I  observe  that  to-day's  Tribune  contains  a  long  personal  explanation 
from  Mr.  Greeley  of  the  part  which  he  took  in  the  action  of  the  Chicago 
Convention.  It  is  never  easy  for  a  public  man  to  be  the  historian  of  his 
own  exploits.  If  he  be  a  vain  man,  he  will  exaggerate  his  personal  influence ; 
if  he  be  an  over-modest  one,  he  will  underrate  it.  It  is  scarcely  necessary 
to  say  that  Mr.  Greeley  has  fallen  into  the  latter  mistake.  With  the  gene- 
rosity which  belongs  to  his  nature,  and  which  a  feeling  not  unlike  remorse 
may  have  stimulated  into  unwonted  activity,  he  awards  to  others  the 
credit  which  belongs  transcendently  to  himself.  The  main  work  of  the 
Chicago  Convention  was  the  defeat  of  Governor  Seward ;  that  was  the  only 
specific  and  distinct  object  towards  which  its  conscious  efforts  were 
directed.  The  great  point  aimed  at  was  Mr.  Seward's  defeat ;  and  in  that 
endeavour  Mr.  Greeley  laboured  harder,  and  did  ten-fold  more,  than  the 
whole  family  of  Blairs,  together  with  all  the  gubernatorial  candidates,  to 
whom  he  modestly  hands  over  the  honours  of  the  effective  campaign.  He 
had  special  qualifications,  as  well  as  a  special  love  for  the  task,  to  which 
none  of  the  others  could  lay  any  claim.  For  twenty  years  he  had  been 
sustaining  the  political  principles  and  vindicating  the  political  conduct 
of  Mr.  Seward,  through  the  columns  of  the  most  influential  political 
newspaper  in  the  country.  He  had  infused  into  the  popular  mind,  espe- 
cially throughout  the  Western  States,  the  most  profound  and  thorough 
devotion  to  the  anti-slavery  sentiments  which  had  given  character  to  Mr. 
Seward's  public  career ;  be  had  vindicated  his  opinions  upon  naturaliza- 
tion and  upon  the  organization  of  the  Know-Nothing  party  from  the 
assaults  made  upon,  ta^nt ;  he  had  urged  his  reelection  to  the  Senate  ir 
the  face  of  all  the  teitiments  which  had  made  him  obnoxious  to  a  portion 
of  his  constituent-,;  no  had  gone  far  beyond  him  in  expression  of  hostility 
to  slavery,  in  p'Jlvuon  of  armed  attempts  for  its  overthrow,  and  it 
assaults  upon  that  clause  of  the  Constitution  which  requires  the  surrender 
of  fugitive  slaves;  anu  he  was  known  to  have  been  for  more  than  twenty 
years  his  personal  friend  and  political  supporter.  These  things  gave  him 
a  hold  upon  the  Republican  sentiment  of  the  country,  and  a  weight  of 
authority  in  everything  relating  to  Governor  Seward  to  which  neither  '  old 
Blair  of  the  Globe,'  a's  Mr.  Greeley  styles  him,  nor  both  his  sons,  could  for 
a  moment  lay  claim.  His  voice  was  potential  precisely  where  Governor 
Seward  was  strongest, — because  it  was  supposed  to  be  that  of  a  friend, 
strong  in  his  personal  attachment  -nd  devotion,  and  driven  into  opposi- 
tion on  this  occasion  solely  by  the  despairing  conviction  that  the  welfare 
of  the  country  and  the  triumpn  of  the  Republican  cause  demanded  the 
sacrifice.  He  laboured  persona.i_.  :*v  the  elegates  as  they  arrived, — 
commending  himself  always  to  tuel  t  »'  d  T  ce  by  prjfessions  of  regan 


MB.  RAYMOND'S  ATTACK.  345 

and  the  most  zealous  friendship  for  Governor  Seward,  but  presenting 
defeat,  even  in  New  York,  as  the  inevitable  result  of  his  nomination. 

"  Mr.  Greeley  was  largely  indebted  to  the  forbearance  of  those  upon 
whom  he  was  waging  this  warfare  for  the  means  of  making  it  effectual. 
While  it  was  known  to  some  of  them  that,  nearly  six  years  ago  —  in 
November,  1854 — he  had  privately,  but  distinctly,  repudiated  all  further 
political  friendship  for  and  alliance  with  Governor  Seward,  and  menaced 
him  with  his  hostility  whenever  it  could  be  made  most  effective,  for  the 
avowed  reason  that  Governor  Seward  had  never  aided  or  advised  his 
elevation  to  office ;  that  he  had  never  recognized  his  claim  to  such  official 
promotion,  but  had  tolerated  the  elevation  of  men  known  to  be  obnoxious 
to  him,  and  who  had  rendered  far  less  service  to  the  party  than  he  had 
done, — no  use  was  made  of  this  knowledge  in  quarters  where  it  would 
have  disarmed  the  deadly  effect  of  his  pretended  friendship  for  the  man 
upon  whom  he  was  thus  deliberately  wreaking  the  long-hoarded  revenge 
of  a  disappointed  office-seeker.  He  was  still  allowed  to  represent  to  the 
delegates  from  Vermont,  New  Hampshire,  Ohio,  Indiana,  and  other  States 
known  to  be  in  favour  of  Governor  Seward's  nomination,  that,  while  he 
desired  it  upon  the  strongest  grounds  of  personal  and  political  friendship, 
he  believed  it  would  be  fatal  to  the  success  of  the  cause.  Being  thua 
stimulated  by  a  hatred  he  had  secretly  cherished  for  years, — protected  by 
the  forbearance  of  those  whom  he  assailed,  and  strong  in  the  confidence 
of  those  upon  whom  he  sought  to  operate — it  is  not  strange  that  Mr. 
Greeley's  efforts  should  have  been  crowned  with  success.  But  it  is  per- 
fectly  safe  to  say  that  no  other  man — certainly  no  one  occupying  a  position 
less  favourable  for  such  an  assault — could  possibly  have  accomplished 
that  result. 

"We  deem  it  only  just  to  Mr. Greeley  thus  early  to  award  him  the  full 
credit  for  the  main  result  of  the  Chicago  Convention,  because  his  own 
modesty  will  prevent  his  claiming  it, — at  all  events  until  the  new  Republi- 
can administration  shall  be  in  position  to  distribute  its  awards.  It  is  not 
right  that  merit  so  conspicuous  should  remain  so  long  in  the  shade. 
Even  the  most  transcendent  services  are  in  danger  of  being  forgotten,  in 
the  tumult  and  confusion  of  a  contested  election;  and  we  cheerfully 
tender,  for  Mr.  Greeley's  use,  this  record  of  his  deserts,  when  he  may  claim 
at  the  hands  of  his  new  associates  that  payment  for  lack  uf  which  he  has 
deserted  and  betrayed  his  old  ones." 

The  assertion  made  in  Mr.  Raymond's  letter  that  Mr.  Greeley 
was  a  disappointed  office-seeker,  wreaking  at  Chicago  long- 
hoarded  revenge  on  Mr.  Seward,  was  echoed  and  reechoed  by 
many  journals,  and  believed  by  large  numbers  of  persons. 
The  principal  proof  of  Mr.  Greeley's  hostility  to  Mr.  Seward 
was  said  to  lie  in  a  letter  of  the  former,  written  in  1854.  The 


346  UFE  OF  HORACE  GREELEY. 

publication  of  that  letter  Mr.  Greeley  demanded  from  day  to 
day  in  The  Tribune,  and  it  being  at  last  produced,  was  pub- 
lished. It  is  as  follows: 

"  NEW- YORK,  Saturday  eve.,  Nov.  11, 1854V 

"GOVERNOR  SEWARD: —  The  election  is  over,  and  its  results  sufficiently 
ascertained.  It  seems  to  me  a  fitting  time  to  announce  to  you  the  dissolu- 
tion of  the  political  firm  of  Seward,  Weed,  and  Greeley,  by  the  withdrawal 
of  the  junior  partner,  —  said  withdrawal  to  take  effect  on  the  morning 
after  the  first  Tuesday  in  February  next.  And,  as  it  may  seem  a  great  pre 
sumption  in  me  to  assume  that  any  such  firm  exists,  especially  since  the 
public  was  advised,  rather  more  than  a  year  ago,  by  an  editorial  rescript  in 
The  Evening  Journal,  formally  reading  me  out  of  the  Whig  party,  that  I 
was  esteemed  no  longer  either  useful  or  ornamental  in  the  concern,  you 
will,  I  am  sure,  indulge  me  in  some  reminiscences  which  seem  to  befit  the 
occasion. 

"I  was  a  poor  young  printer  and  editor  of  a  literary  journal,  —  a  very 
active  and  bitter  Whig  in  a  small  way,  but  not  seeking  to  be  known  out  of 
my  own  ward  committee,  —  when,  after  the  great  political  revulsion  of 
1837,  I  was  one  day  called  to  the  City  Hotel,  where  two  strangers  intro- 
duced themselves  as  Thurlow  Weed  and  Lewis  Benedict  of  Albany.  They 
told  me  that  a  cheap  campaign  paper  of  a  peculiar  stamp  at  Albany  had 
been  resolved  on,  and  that  I  had  been  selected  to  edit  it.  The  announce- 
ment might  well  be  deemed  flattering  by  one  who  had  never  even  sought 
the  notice  of  the  great,  and  who  was  not  known  as  a  partisan  writer,  and  I 
eagerly  embraced  their  proposals.  They  asked  me  to  fix  my  salary  for  the 
year;  I  named  $1,000,  which  they  agreed  to;  and  I  did  the  work  required 
to  the  best  of  my  ability.  It  was  work  that  made  no  figure  and  created  no 
sensation ;  but  I  loved  it,  and  I  did  it  well.  When  it  was  done,  you  were 
Governor,  dispensing  offices  worth  $3,000  to  $30,000  per  year  to  your  friends 
and  compatriots,  and  I  returned  to  my  garret  and  my  crust,  and  my  des- 
perate battle  with  pecuniary  obligations  heaped  upon  me  by  bad  partners 
in  business  and  the  disastrous  events  of  1837.  I  believe  that  it  did  not  then 
occur  to  me  that  some  one  of  these  abundant  places  might  have  been 
offered  to  me  without  injustice;  I  now  think  it  should  have  occurred  to 
you.  If  it  did  occur  to  me,  I  was  not  the  man  to  ask  you  for  it;  I  think 
that  should  not  have  been  necessary.  I  only  remember  that  no  friend  at 
Albany  inquired  as  to  my  pecuniary  circumstances,  that  your  friend  (but 
not  mine)  Robert  C.  Wetmore  was  one  of  the  chief  dispensers  of  your  pat- 
ronage here ;  and  that  such  devoted  compatriots  as  A.  H.  Wells  and  John 
Hooks  were  lifted  by  you  out  of  pauperism  into  independence,  as  I  am  glad 
I  was  not;  and  yet  an  inquiry  from  you  as  to  my  needs  and  means  at  that 
time  would  have  been  timely,  and  held  ever  in  grateful  remembrance. 
"  In  the  Harrison  campaign  of  1840  I  was  again  designated  to  edit  a 


"SEWARD,  WEED,  AND  GREELEY."  347 

campaign  paper.  I  published  it  as  well,  and  ought  to  have  madt  some 
thing  by  it,  in  spite  of  its  extremely  low  price ;  my  extreme  poverty  was 
the  main  reason  why  I  did  not.  It  compelled  me  to  hire  press-work, 
mailing,  etc.,  done  by  the  job,  and  high  charges  for  extra  work  nearly  ate 
me  up.  At  the  close,  I  was  still  without  property  and  in  debt,  but  this 
paper  had  rather  improved  my  position. 

"  Now  came  the  great  scramble  of  the  swell  mob  of  coon  minstrels  and 
cider-suckers  at  Washington,  —  I  not  being  counted  iu.  Several  regiments 
of  them  went  on  from  this  city;  but  no  one  of  the  whole  crowd,  though  I 
say  it  who  should  not,  had  done  so  much  toward  General  Harrison's  nom. 
ination  and  election  as  yours  respectfully.  I  asked  nothing,  expected 
nothing;  but  you,  Governor  Seward,  ought  to  have  asked  that  I  be  post- 
master of  New- York.  Your  asking  would  have  been  in  vain;  but  it 
would  have  been  an  act  of  grace  neither  wasted  nor  undeserved. 

"  I  soon  after  started  The  Tribune,  because  I  was  urged  to  do  so  by  cer- 
tain of  your  friends,  and  because  such  a  paper  was  needed  here.  I  was 
promised  certain  pecuniary  aid  in  so  doing;  it  might  have  been  given  me 
without  cost  or  risk  to  any  one.  All  I  ever  had  was  a  loan  by  piecemeal 
of  $1,000  from  James  Coggeshall,  —  God  bless  his  honoured  memory!  I 
did  not  ask  for  this,  and  I  think  it  is  the  one  sole  case  in  which  I  ever 
received  a  pecuniary  favour  from  a  political  associate.  I  am  very  thankful 
that  he  did  not  die  till  it  was  fully  repaid. 

"And  let  me  here  honour  one  grateful  recollection.  When  the  Whig 
party  under  your  rule  had  offices  to  give  my  name  was  never  thought  of; 
but  when,  in  1843-43,  we  were  hopelessly  out  of  power,  I  was  honoured  with 
the  party  nomination  for  State  Printer.  When  we  came  again  to  have  a  State 
Printer  to  elect  as  well  as  nominate,  the  place  went  to  Weed,  as  it  ought. 
Yet  it  is  worth  something  to  know  that  there  was  once  a  time  when  it  was 
not  deemed  too  great  a  sacrifice  to  recognize  me  as-belonging  to  your  house- 
hold. If  a  new  office  had  not  since  been  created  on  purpose  to  give  its 
valuable  patronage  to  H.  J.  Raymond  and  enable  St.  John  to  show  forth 
his  'Times'  as  the  organ  of  the  Whig  State  Administration,  I  should  have 
been  still  more  grateful. 

"  In  1848  your  star  again  rose,  and  my  warmest  hopes  were  realized  in 
your  election  to  the  Senate.  I  was  no  longer  needy,  and  had  no  more  claim 
than  desire  to  be  recognized  by  General  Taylor.  I  think  I  had  some  claim 
to  forbearance  from  you.  What  I  received  therexipon  was  a  most  humil- 
iating lecture  in  the  shape  of  a  decision  in  the  libel  case  of  Redfield  and 
Pringle,  and  an  obligation  to  publish  it  in  my  own  and  the  other  journal 
of  our  supposed  firm.  I  thought  and  still  think  this  lecture  needlessly 
cruel  and  mortifying.  The  plaintiffs,  after  using  my  columns  to  the  ex- 
tent of  their  needs  or  desires,  stopped  writing,  and  called  on  me  for  the 
name  of  their  assailant.  I  proffered  it  to  them,  —  a  thoroughly  responsible 
name.  They  refused  to  accept  it,  unless  it  should  prove  to  be  one  of  the 
four  or  five  first  men  in  Batavia!  —  when  they  had  known  from  the  first  who 
it  was,  and  that  it  was  neither  of  them.  They  would  not  accept  that  wh  ieh 
they  had  demanded;  they  sued  me  instead  for  money,  and  money  you  were 


34:8  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

at  liberty  to  give  them  to  your  heart's  content.  I  do  not  think  you  wer« 
at  liberty  to  humiliate  a:e  in  the  eyes  of  my  own  and  your '  public  as  you 
did.  I  think  you  exalted  your  own  judicial  sternness  and  fearlessness 
unduly  at  my  expense.  I  think  you  had  a  better  occasion  for  the  display 
of  these  qualities,  when  Webb  threw  himself  untimely  upon  you  for  a  par- 
don  which  he  had  done  all  a  man  could  do  to  demerit.  (His  paper  is 
paying  you  for  it  now.) 

"  I  have  publicly  set  forth  my  view  of  your  and  our  duty  with  respect  to 
fusion,  Nebraska,  and  party  designations.  I  will  not  repeat  any  of  that. 
I  have  referred  also  to  Weed's  reading  me  out  of  the  Whig  party,  —  my 
crime  being,  in  this  as  in  some  other  things,  that  of  doing  to-day  what 
more  politic  persons  will  not  be  ready  to  do  till  to-morrow. 

"  Let  me  speak  of  the  late  canvass.  I  was  once  sent  to  Congress  for 
ninety  days,  merely  to  enable  Jim  Brooks  to  secure  a  seat  therein  for  four 
years.  I  think  I  never  hinted  to  any  human  being  that  I  would  have  liked 
to  be  put  forward  for  any  place.  But  James  W.  White  (you  hardly  know 
how  good  and  true  a  man  he  is)  started  my  name  for  Congress,  and  Brooks's 
packed  delegation  thought  I  could  help  him  through ;  so  I  was  put  on 
behind  him.  But  this  last  spring,  after  the  Nebraska  question  had  created 
a  new  state  of  things  at  the  North,  one  or  two  personal  friends,  of  no  po- 
litical consideration,  suggested  my  name  as  a  candidate  for  Governor,  and 
I  did  not  discourage  them.  Soon,  the  persons  who  were  afterward  mainly 
instrumental  in  nominating  Clark  came  about  me,  and  asked  if  I  could 
secure  the  Know-Nothing  vote.  I  told  them  I  neither  could  nor  would 
touch  it;  on  the  contrary,  I  loathed  and  repelled  it.  Thereupon  they 
turned  upon  Clark. 

"  I  said  nothing,  did  nothing.  A  hundred  people  asked  me  who  should 
be  run  for  Governor.  I  sometimes  indicated  Patterson;  I  never  hinted  at 
my  own  name.  But  by  and  by  Weed  came  down  and  called  me  to  him, 
to  tell  me  why  he  could  not  support  me  for  Governor.  (I  had  never  asked 
nor  counted  on  his  support.) 

"  I  am  sure  Weed  did  not  mean  to  humiliate  me ;  but  he  did  it.  The 
upshot  of  his  discourse  (very  cautiously  stated)  was  this:  If  I  were  a 
candidate  for  Governor,  I  should  beat,  not  myself  only,  but  you.  Perhaps 
that  was  true.  But  as  I  had  in  no  manner  solicited  his  or  your  support,  I 
thought  this  might  have  been  said  to  my  friends  rather  than  to  me.  I  sus- 
pect it  is  true  that  I  could  not  have  been  elected  Governor  as  a  Whig.  But 
had  he  and  you  been  favourable,  there  would  have  been  a  party  in  the  State 
ere  this  whicli  could  and  would  have  elected  me  to  any  post,  without  injur- 
ing itself  or  endangering  your  re-election. 

"  It  was  in  vain  that  I  urged  that  I  had  in  no  manner  asked  a  nomination. 
At  length  I  was  nettled  by  his  language  —  well  intended,  but  very  cutting 
as  addressed  by  him  to  me — to  say,  in  substance,  'Well,  then,  make 
Patterson  Governor,  and  try  my  name  for  Lieutenant.  To  lose  this  place 

'"If  I  am  not  mistaken,  this  judgment  is  the  only  speech,  letter,  or 
document  addressed  to  the  public  in  which  you  ever  recognized  my  exist* 
ence.  I  hope  I  may  not  go  down  to  posterity  as  embalmed  therein." 


u  EEWAED,  WEED,  AND  GREKLEY.''  349 

is  a  matter  of  no  importance ;  and  we  can  see  whether  I  am  really  so 
odious.' 

"  I  should  have  hated  to  serve  as  Lieutenant-Governor,  but  I  should  have 
gloried  in  running  for  the  post.  I  want  to  have  my  enemies  all  upon  me 
at  once ;  I  am  tired  of  fighting  them  piecemeal.  And,  though  I  should 
have  been  beaten  in  the  canvass,  I  know  that  my  running  would  have 
helped  the  ticket,  and  helped  my  paper. 

"  It  was  thought  best  to  let  the  matter  take  another  course.  No  other 
name  could  have  been  put  on  the  ticket  so  bitterly  humbling  to  me  as  that 
which  was  selected.  The  nomination  was  given  to  Raymond;  the  fight 
left  to  me.  And,  Governor  Seward,  /  have  made  it,  though  it  be  conceited 
in  me  to  say  so.  What  little  fight  there  has  been  I  have  stirred  up.  Even 
Weed  has  not  been  (I  speak  of  his  paper)  hearty  in  this  contest,  while  the 
journal  of  the  Whig  Lieutenant-Governor  has  taken  care  of  its  own  inter- 
ests  and  let  the  canvass  take  care  of  itself,  as  it  early  declared  it  would  do. 
That  journal  has  (because  of  its  milk-and-water  course)  some  twenty  thou- 
sand subscribers  in  this  city  and  its  suburbs,  and,  of  these  twenty  thousand, 
I  venture  to  say  more  voted  for  Ullmann  and  Scroggs  than  for  Clark  and 
Raymond;  The  Tribune  (also  because  of  its  character)  has  but  eight 
thousand  subscribes  within  the  same  radius,  and  I  venture  to  say  that  of  it3 
habitual  readers  nine-tenths  voted  for  Clark  and  Raymond,  —  very  few  for 
Ullmann  and  Scroggs.  I  had  to  bear  the  brunt  of  the  contest,  and  take  a 
terrible  responsibility  in  order  to  prevent  the  Whigs  uniting  upon  James 
W.  Barker  in  order  to  defeat  Fernando  Wood.  Had  Barker  been  elected 
here,  neither  you  nor  I  could  walk  these  streets  without  being  hooted,  and 
Know-Nothingism  would  have  swept  like  a  prairie-fire.  I  stopped  Barker's 
election  at  the  cost  of  incurring  the  deadliest  enmity  of  the  defeated  gang; 
and  I  have  been  rebuked  for  it  by  the  Lieutenant-Governor's  paper.  At 
the  critical  moment,  he  came  out  against  John  Wheeler  in  favour  of  Charle? 
H.  Marshall  (who  would  have  been  your  deadliest  enemy  in  the  House), 
and  even  your  Colonel  General's  paper,  which  was  even  with  me  in  insist- 
ing  that  Wheeler  should  be  returned,  wheeled  about  at  the  last  moment 
and  went  in  for  Marshall,  — The  Tribune  alone  clinging  to  Wheeler  till  the 
last.  I  rejoice  that  they  who  turned  so  suddenly  were  not  able  to  turn  all 
their  readers. 

"  Governor  Seward,  I  know  that  some  of  your  most  cherished  friends 
think  me  a  great  obstacle  to  your  advancement;  that  John  Schoolcraft,  for 
one,  insists  that  you  and  Weed  shall  not  be  identified  with  me.  I  trust, 
after  a  time,  you  will  not  be.  I  trust  I  shall  never  be  found  in  opposition 
to  you;  I  have  no  further  wish  but  to  glide  out  of  the  newspaper  world  as 
quietly  and  as  speedily  as  possible,  join  my  family  in  Europe,  and  if  pos- 
sible stay  there  quite  a  time,  —  long  enough  to  cool  my  fevered  brain  and 
renovate  my  overtasked  energies.  All  I  ask  is  that  we  shall  be  counted 
even  on  the  morning  after  the  first  Tuesday  in  February,  as  aforesaid,  and 
that  I  may  thereafter  take  such  course  as  seems  best  without  reference 
to  the  past. 

"  You  have  done  me  acts  of  valued  kindness  in  the  line  of  your  profea 


350  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

sion:  let  me  close  with  the  assurance  that  these  will  ever  be  gratefully 
remembered  by  Yours, 

"HORACE  GREELEY. 
"  HON.  WILUAM  H.  SEW  ARC,  present." 

Mr.  Greeley's  comments  upon  the  publication  of  this  letter 
were  manly  and  independent.  "The  moral  I  would  incul- 
cate," said  he,  "  is  a  trite  one  but  none  the  less  important. 
It  is  summed  up  in  the  Scriptural  injunction  '  Put  not  your 
trust  in  princes.'  Men,  even  the  best,  are  frail  and  mutable, 
while  principle  is  sure  and  eternal.  Be  no  man's  man,  but 
Truth's  and  your  country's.  You  will  be  sorely  tempted  at 
times  to  take  this  or  that  great  man  for  your  oracle  and  guide, 
—  it  is  easy  and  tempting  to  lean,  to  follow,  and  trust,  —  but 
it  is  safer  and  wiser  to  look  ever  through  your  own  eyes,  to 
tread  your  own  path,  to  trust  implicitly  in  God  alone.  Tho 
atmosphere  is  a  little  warmer  inside  some  great  man's  castle, 
but  the  free  air  of  heaven  is  ever  so  much  purer  and  more 
bracing.  My  active  political  life  may  be  said  to  have  begun 
with  Governor  Seward's  appearance  on  the  broader  stage;  for 
I  edited  my  first  political  sheet  (The  Constitution)  in  1834, 
when  he  was  first  a  candidate  for  Governor,  and  I  very  ardently 
laboured  in  1854  to  secure  his  re-election  to  the  Senate. 
Thenceforward  I  have  had  no  idol,  but  have  acted  without 
personal  bias  as  the  highest  public  good  has  from  time  to  time 
seemed  to  me  to  demand.  I  have  differed  frankly  with  Gover- 
nor Seward  on  some  financial  points;  but  I  think  have  uttered 
more  praise  with  less  blame  of  him  than  of  any  other  living 
statesman.  And  if  ever  in  my  life  I  discharged  a  public  duty 
in  utter  disregard  of  personal  considerations,  I  did  so  at  Chi- 
cago last  month.  I  was  no  longer  a  devotee  of  Governor 
Seward;  but  I  was  equally  independent  of  all  others;  and  if  I 
had  been  swayed  by  feeling  alone,  I  should  have,  for  many 
reasons,  preferred  him  to  any  of  his  competitors.  Our  per- 
sonal intercourse,  as  well  since  as  before  my  letter  herewith 
published,  had  always  been  frank  and  kindly,  and  I  was  never 
insensible  to  his  many  good  and  some  great  qualities,  both  of 
head  and  heart.  But  I  did  not  and  do  not  believe  it  advisable 
that  he  should  be  the  Republican  candidate  for  President;  and 


"SEWAKD,  WEED,  AND  GKEELET."  351 

I  acted  in  full  accordance  with  my  deliberate  convictions. 
Need  I  add,  that  each  subsequent  day's  developments  have 
tended  to  strengthen  my  confidence  that  what  I  did  was  not 
only  well  meant,  but  well  done?" 

Mr.  Weed  had  a  long,  excellent  article  on  the  subject  in  The 
Evening  Journal,  which  concluded  as  follows : 

"One  word  in  relation  to  the  supposed  'political  firm.'  Mr.  Greeley 
brought  into  it  his  full  quota  of  capital.  But  were  there  no  beneficial 
results,  no  accruing  advantages,  to  himself?  Did  he  not  attain,  in  the  six- 
teen years,  a  high  position,  a  world-wide  reputation,  and  an  ample  for- 
tune?  Admit,  as  we  do,  that  he  (Mr.  Greeley)  is  not  as  wealthy  as  we  wish 
he  was,  it  is  not  because  The  Tribune  has  not  made  his  fortune,  but  because 
he  did  not  keep  it, —  because  it  went,  as  other  people's  money  goes,  to 
friends,  to  pay  indorsements,  and  in  bad  investments. 

"  We  have  both  been  liberally,  nay,  generously  sustained  by  our  party. 
Mr.  Greeley  differs  with  us  in  regarding  patrons  of  newspapers  as  con. 
ferring  favours.  In  giving  them  the  worth  of  their  money,  he  holds  that 
*.hc-  account  is  balanced.  "We,  on  the  other  hand,  have  ever  held  the  rela- 
tion of  newspaper  editor  and  subscriber  as  one  of  fraternity.  Viewed  in 
this  aspect,  the  editors  of  The  Tribune  and  Evening  Journal  have  manifold 
reasons  for  cherishing  grateful  recollections  of  the  liberal  and  abiding 
confidence  and  patronage  of  their  party  and  friends. 

"  In  conclusion,  we  cannot  withhold  an  expression  of  sincere  regret  that 
this  letter  has  been  called  out.  Having  ^remained  six  years  in 'blissful 
ignorance '  of  its  contents,  we  should  much  preferred  to  have  ever  remained 
so.  It  jars  harshly  upon  cherished  memories.  It  destroys  ideals  of  dis- 
interestedness and  generosity  which  relieved  political  life  from  so  much 
that  is  selfish,  sordid,  and  rapacious." 

It  is  very  evident  that  Mr.  Weed  had  nothing  to  do  with 
fishing  out  this  letter  from  Mr.  Seward,  and  we  may  safely 
conclude  from  the  reluctance  with  which  he  gave  it  up,  that  he 
regretted  if  he  did  not  condemn  the  public  use  which  had  been 
made  of  a  paper  evidently  intended  for  his  eye  alone. 

It  is  only  necessary  to  add  that  the  public  press  of  the  poli- 
tical party  to  which  Mr.  Greeley  belonged  very  generally 
spoke  in  favourable  terms  of  his  letter,  and  in  approbation  of 
the  course  he  had  pursued  at  Chicago.  The  heated  partisans 
of  Mr.  Seward  were  unfortunate,  rather  than  really  blame- 
worthy. They  failed  fully  to  understand  that  one  may  be  a 
sincere  friend  to  another  and  yet  have  opinions  of  his  own.  It 
was  impossible  for  Horace  Greeley  to  become  a  toady,  or  a 


352  LIFE  OF   HOEA.CE    GREELEY. 

mere  tail  to  any  kite.  He  never  was  so  wholly  devoted  to  Mr. 
Seward  as  he  was  to  Henry  Clay;  and  he  did  not  labour  more 
zealously  to  defeat  Mr.  Seward  at  Chicago,  in  1860,  than  he 
had  done  to  defeat  Mr.  Clay's  nomination  at  Harrisburgh  in 
1839.  In  this  instance,  he  was  potentially  aided  by  Mr.  Weed, 
who  was  no  less  friendly  to  Clay  than  he.  In  the  case  of  Clay, 
there  was  a  mutual  understanding;  in  that  of  Seward,  a 
mutual  misunderstanding.  Hence  crimination  and  recrimin- 
ation; estrangement;  something  of  error  on  either  side; 
nothing,  so  far  as  the  old  firm  of  "  Seward,  Weed,  and  Greeley  " 
is  concerned,  which  should  not  be  forever  contemplated  more 
in  sorrow  than  in  anger. 

Let  us  now  return  to  the  scene  whence  originated  the  pub- 
lic discussion  of  misunderstandings  which,  but  for  too  prying 
a  curiosity,  and  too  generous,  confiding  a  nature,  would  have 
been  allowed  to  repose  in  the  quiet  of  personal  confidence. 

The  convention  nominated  Hannibal  Hamlin,  of  Maine,  its 
candidate  for  Yice-President.  Before  the  nominations,  how- 
ever, the  platform  had  been  adopted,  amid  great  enthusiasm 
and  with  perfect  unanimity.  Of  the  committee  preparing  this 
declaration  of  principles,  Mr.  Greeley  was  a  most  laborious 
member.  It  is  quite  generally  conceded  that  it  was  a  model 
of  this  kind  of  composition,  being  not  only  wise  in  statement 
of  dogmas,  but  terse,  strong,  and  polished  in  expression.  For 
this  Mr.  Greeley  is  doubtless  entitled  to  no  little  credit,  but 
he  awarded  special  praise  herein  to  Mr.  John  A.  Kasson,  of 
Iowa,  afterwards  First  Assistant  Postmaster  General,  and  sub- 
sequently a  Eepresentative  in  Congress.  It  is  a  curious  fact 
showing  the  adroitness  with  which  one  portion  of  the  platform 
was  framed,  that  Mr.  Greeley  sustained  it  from  the  standpoint 
of  "  Protection  "  no  less  heartily  than  Mr.  Bryant  sustained  it 
as  a  Free-Trader. 

Thus  with  a  popular  ticket  and  a  popular  platform, —  both 
to  great  extent  due  to  the  influence  and  labours  of  Horace 
Greeley,  the  party  destined  to  secure  success,  entered  upon  the 
active  operations  of  the  campaign.  The  signs  of  the  times  did 
not  indicate  that  it  would  be  a  year  of  jubilee  for  the  Demoe 
racy.  Their  two  conventions  met,  according  to  adjournment, 


SENATOR  DOUGLAS.  353 

one  at  Baltimore,  the  other  at  Richmond,  the  latter  soon 
adjourning  to  Baltimore.  The  disagreements  were  irrecon- 
cilable, and  each  body  put  forth  a  ticket  and  announced  a 
platform.  By  those  whom  it  will  be  thought  proper  to  call 
"the  regulars,"  Senator  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  of  Illinois,  waa 
nominated  for  the  Presidency,  and  Senator  Benjamin  Fitzpat 
rick  for  the  Vice-Presidency.  The  latter  declining,  the  Hon. 
llerschel  Y.  Johnson,  of  Georgia,  was  substituted  in  his  place. 
The  seceders  nominated  the  Hon.  John  C.  Breckinridge,  then 
Vice-President  of  the  United  States,  for  President,  and  Hon. 
Joseph  Lane,  of  Oregon,  for  Vice-President. 

Meantime,  a  convention  of  the  "  American  "  party,  so  called, 
IAICUS  a  non  lucendo,  because  there  was  nothing  in  it  especially 
entitled  to  be  styled  American,  had  been  held  in  Baltimore, 
May  19,  which  had  nominated  John  Bell,  of  Tennessee,  for 
President,  and  Edward  Everett,  of  Massachusetts,  for  Vice- 
President.  These  delegates  now  adopted  the  name  of  the 
"  Constitutional  Union  "  party,  and  expressly  declared  that  it 
was  the  part  of  patriotism  and  of  duty  to  recognize  no  polit- 
ical principle  other  than  the  Constitution,  the  Union  of  the 
States,  and  the  enforcement  of  the  laws.  This  party  improved 
on  the  ancient  adage,  and  in  its  intense  conservatism,  demanded 
that  we  must  let  dead  enough  alone,  and  not  even  bury  it  out 
of  sight. 

All  of  the  candidates  for  President  were  men  of  ability  and 
character.  Mr.  Lincoln,  as  we  have  seen,  had  recently  won 
national  renown  by  his  powerful  debates  with  Judge  Douglas, 
many  speeches  in  Illinois,  and  profoundly  thoughtful  addresses 
in  other  States.  Mr.  Douglas  was  wonderfully  popular  with 
the  Democratic  masses  of  the  North.  Like  Mr.  Lincoln,  he 
had  long  struggled  to  win  position  and  fame  by  virtue  of  his 
talents  and  energies  alone;  and,  in  the  party  of  the  majority 
in  his  State,  had  greatly  succeeded.  He  was  both  a  great 
debater  and  a  great  organizer.  No  public  man  was  ever  more 
faithful  to  his  friends;  none  ever  had  more  devoted  adherents. 
It  is  probably  true  that  no  American  statesman,  unless  it  be 
Andrew  Jackson  himself,  ever  had  such  hosts  of  friends  not 
only  ready  but  anxious  to  fight  for  him,  as  Stephen  A.  Doug- 
23 


354  LIFE  OF   HORACE   OREFJ.ET. 

las.  His  personal  magnetism  was  unequalled.  Judge  Douglas 
was  short  in  stature,  though  most  compactly  built;  so  that  ho 
was  as  strong  physically  as  he  was  powerful  in  debate.  Hence 
his  sobriquet  of  "'The  Little  Giant"  was  unusually  appro- 
priate. He  seemed  to  stand  so  firmly  on  his  feet  that  it 
would  be  impossible  to  uptrip  him.  Mr.  Breckinridge 
was  a  gentleman  of  brilliant  parts,  and  one  of  the  most 
pleasing  of  public  speakers.  Genial,  warm-hearted,  he  too 
had  vast  numbers  of  devoted  adherents  in  the  South,  and  was 
correctly  esteemed  in  the  country  generally  as  among  the  most 
creditable  representatives  of  those  who  were  said  to  form  "the 
Southern  chivalry."  Mr.  Bell  was  a  statesman  of  many  years' 
experience  in  public  life,  was  justly  entitled  to  the  general 
respect,  but  in  this  campaign  occupied  a  negative,  unaggressive 
position.  lie  afterwards  quailed  before  the  threatening  attitude 
of  the  South  against  the  Union,  and,  in  Horace  Greeley's  opin 
ion,  became  entitled  to  severer  condemnation  than  Jefferson 
Davis  himself.  In  this  opinion  history  will  probably  concur, 
relating  with  indignant  sadness  the  melancholy  end  of  a  life 
which,  but  for  its  late  mistakes,  might  have  been  placed 
among  those  by  which  the  republic  had  been  blessed  and 
saved. 

Of  the  candidates  for  Vice-President,  Mr.  Everett  was  the 
only  one  of  illustrious  name.  A  statesman  of  the  old  school, 
he  had  dropped  behind  his  age,  but  not  without  having  added 
renown  to  his  country's  statesmanship  and  diplomacy,  and 
greatly  extended  the  influence  and .  good  report  of  American 
literature.  Mr.  Hamlin,  the  candidate  of  the  Republicans,  had 
not  been  greatly  distinguished,  but  at  the  time  of  his  nomina- 
tion was  a  respected  member  of  the  Senate.  He  had  left  the 
Democratic  party  in  1856,  in  a  speech  in  the  Senate  of  remarka- 
ble power  and  eloquence,  which  received  all  the  more  praise 
from  the  public  because  it  was  the  first  and  last  great  speech 
in  that  chamber  by  him.  He  came  near  being  called  "  Single 
Speech  Hamlin,"  in  imitation  of  a  similar  thing  in  the 
history  of  an  English  politician.  Mr.  Johnson,  associated 
on  the  ticket  with  Mr.  Douglas,  was  a  man  of  respectable 
talents  and  excellent  character;  a  little  too  eruptive,  per- 


THE   ELECTION   OF   1860.  355 

haps,  of  "Southern  fire,"  but  without  much  unfortunate 
record.  Mr.  Lane  was  an  "intense  pro-slavery  Democrat;"  a 
man  who  had  had  greatness  thrust  upon  him;  was  wonder- 
full  y  ignorant;  and  was  even  charged  with  writing  the  name 
of  Deity  with  a  little  g.  Such  dead-wood  frequently  drifts 
into  the  stream  of  politics;  and  whence  it  cometh  or  whither  it 
goeth  no  man  can  tell. 

The  campaign  was  exceedingly  animated,  on  the  part  of  the 
Republicans,  from  the  moment  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  nomination. 
As  with  General  Harrison,  there  appeared  to  be  something  in 
his  homely  life  and  character  to  bring  out  the  affections  and 
enthusiasm  of  the  people.  The  nominations  at  Baltimore  but 
increased  the  excitement.  Senator  Douglas  soon  in  person 
went  upon  the  hustings,  and,  addressing  vast  concourses  of 
people,  aroused  the  enthusiasm  of  his  friends  to  the  highest 
pitch.  It  was  certainly  the  liveliest  presidential  campaign  in 
the  history  of  our  country,  excepting  only  that  of  1840.  Com- 
panies of  "  Wide- A  wakes  "  were  formed  by  Republicans  in 
every  neighbourhood,  followed  by  "  Hickory-shirt  Boys  "  on 
the  part  of  the  Douglasites  in  many  portions  of  the  North. 
It  was  astonishing,  too,  how  much  noise  the  "  Bell-Everettites  " 
made  even  in  communities  where  they  were  outvoted  ten, 
twenty,  fifty,  or  even  a  hundred  to  one. 

All  the  orators  and  all  the  journals  of  each  party  undoubt- 
edly did  their  best.  Speak  as  they  might,  write  as  men  might 
on  other  topics,  the  issue  of  the  campaign  was  the  question  of 
Human  Slavery.  It  was  a  dread  issue,  in  which  might  be 
involved  appalling  results,  but  it  was  ably,  conscientiously, 
and  bravely  met.  This  year  The  New- York  Tribune  fairly 
surpassed  itself.  Mr.  Greeley  had  been  assailed,  as  we  have 
seen,  by  men  in  high  standing  in  his  own  party  at  the  very 
inception  of  the  campaign.  This  appears  to  have  aroused  his 
ambition  and  energies  to  their  best  endeavour;  and  it  is  certain 
that  The  Tribune  in  all  its  editions  was  one  of  the  most  poten- 
tial means  in  bringing  about  the  result. 

In  the  election  Mr.  Lincoln  carried  every  free  State  except 
New  Jersey,  and  even  a  portion  of  the  electoral  vote  of  that 
State.  Next  in  popular  strength  was  Mr.  Douglas,  then  Mr. 


356 


TJFE  OF   HORACE   GKEELEY. 


Breckinridge,  and  lowest  of  all  Mr.  Bell.  But  ic  electoral 
votes  Mr.  Douglas  had  only  12,  Mr.  Bell  receiving  39,  Mr. 
Breckinridge  72,  and  Mr.  Lincoln  180. 

The  great  success  of  the  candidates  and  principles  which 
Horace  Greeley  had  been  so  largely  instrumental  in  placing 
before  the  people,  was  forthwith  tortured  into  the  inauguration 
of  opposition  to  the  Union,  resulting  in  that  terrible  civil  war 
of  which  he  became  the  most  impartial  historian  who  has  yet 
narrated  its  momentous  events. 


JOHN   RUSSELL  YOUNG.— See  pages  183,  458,  etc. 


CHAPTER   XX. 

HOME  LIFE. 

Horace  Greeley  at  Home — An  Unpretending  Household  —  Margaret  Ful- 
ler's Description  of  Mr.  Greeley's  Home  —  His  Personal  Habits  —  Toilet 
—  Food  —  His  Hospitality — Tenderness  for  His  Children — The  Death 
of  "Pickie" —  His  Taste  as  to  Home  Adornments  —  Buys  a  Farm. 

ONE  of  the  apparently  necessary  results  of  journalism  is  that 
it  leaves  little  time  to  the  editor  for  social  or  home  enjoy- 
ments. This  is  especially  the  case  where  the  journal  is  a  daily 
paper.  For,  no  matter  what  happens,  the  paper  must  come 
out.  It  can  stop  neither  on  account  of  joy,  or  misery,  or  sick- 
ness, or  death,  or  private  or  public  calamity.  Clouds  may 
obscure  the  sun,  but  storms  must  not  repress  the  daily  journal. 
It  is  our  intellectual  daylight,  and  cannot  be  shut  out  from  the 
world.  Life  justly  became  "  a  demnition  grind  "  to  the  accom- 
plished Mr.  Mantilini  (a  highly  accomplished  fraud,  that  is), 
of  Dickens's  greatest  story.  The  life  of  a  daily  journalist  is 
an  eternal  grind.  The  demands  upon  his  labour  and  study 
are  ceaseless.  The  time  may  come,  perhaps,  when  more  leisure 
shall  be  allowed  the  journalist.  In  that  event,  journalism  will 
be  the  means  of  even  greater  good  than  it  now  is. 

Mr.  Greeley,  as  we  have  seen,  had  been  some  years  married 
before  he  became  the  founder  of  The  New-York  Tribune.  But 
he  had  commenced  his  unusually  busy  life  some  years  before 
his  marriage.  Circumstances,  already  referred  to,  occurred 
soon  after  that  event,  which  prevented  him  from  securing 
many  hours  of  leisure,  even  had  he  been  so  inclined.  The 
latter  years  of  The  New-Yorker,  it  will  be  recollected,  were 
years  of  embarrassment  and  the  pressing  weight  of  debt.  To 
keep  himself  afloat  at  all  almost  constant  toil  was  necessary. 
When  Mr.  Weed,  in  the  interview  which  resulted  in  Mr. 
Greeley's  engagement  as  editor  of  The  Jeffersonian  at  Albany 


358  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELET. 

enquired  if  lie  had  a  family,  Mr.  Greeley  replied,  "  I  have  a 
wife,  but  she  keeps  school,  and  is  no  hindrance  to  the  enter, 
prise."  Both  master  and  mistress  of  the  family,  it  will  be 
seen,  were  hard  workers.  The  wife  was  devoted  to  teaching 
and  to  the  acquisition  of  knowledge.  Such  a  woman  is  often 
described  as  having  "a  mind  of  her  own,"  the  fact  intended 
to  be  made  known  by  this  description  being  that  she  has 
opinions  and  ideas  besides  those  which  gurgle  along  in  the 
old-time  channels;  channels  which  would  be  astonished  out  of 
all  propriety  at  a  storm  or  a  freshet. 

It  may  well  be  supposed,  therefore,  that  Mr.  Greeley's 
household,  in  the  earlier  years  of  life  in  his  own  home,  was 
sufficiently  unpretending.  Himself  ever  a  man  of  the  people, 
he  never  acquired  luxurious  tastes.  He  delighted,  as  he  says 
himself,  in  bare  walls  and  rugged  fare.  And  the  taste  of 
Mrs.  Greeley,  at  least  for  many  years,  was  even  more  severe 
than  his  own,  particularly  as  regards  the  matter  of  rugged 
fare.  Her  rigid  conscientiousness  upon  the  subject  of  food 
prevented  any  lavish  hospitality.  From  the  time  Mr.  Greeley 
went  to  New- York  until  after  the  presidential  campaign  of 
1844,  he  had  always  lived, — much  of  the  time  boarded, — 
within  half  a  mile  of  the  City  Hall.  There  was  not  in  the 
whole  metropolis,  perhaps,  a  more  unpretending  home  than 
that  of  Horace  Greeley  at  a  time  when  he  was  working  harder 
and  doing  more  for  the  Whig  party  than  any  one  of  his 
co  temporaries. 

When  the  great  struggle  of  the  canvass  just  mentioned  was 
over,  says  Mr.  Greeley,  "  and  I  the  worst  beaten  man  on  the 
continent, — worn  out  by  incessant  anxiety  and  effort,  covered 
with  boils,  and  thoroughly  used  up, — I  took  a  long  stride  land- 
ward, removing  to  a  spacious  old  wooden  house,  built  as  a 
country  or  summer  residence  by  Isaac  Lawrence,  formerly 
President  of  the  United  States  Branch  P>ank,  but  which,  since 
his  death,  had  been  neglected,  and  suffered  to  decay.  It  was 
located  on  eight  acres  of  ground,  including  a  wooded  ravine, 
or  dell,  on  the  East  River,  at  Turtle  Bay,  nearly  opposite  the 
southernmost  point  of  Blackwell's  Island,  amid  shade  and 
fruit  trees,  abundant  shrubbery,  ample  garden,  etc.;  and, 


MR.   GRKELEt's  HOME.  359 

though  now  for  years  perforated  by  streets,  and  in  good  part 
covered  by  buildings,  was  then  so  secluded  as  to  be  only 
reached  by  a  narrow,  devious  private  lane,  exceedingly  dark  at 
night  for  one  accustomed  to  the  glare  of  gas-lamps;  the  near- 
est highway  being  the  old  '  Boston  Road '  at  Forty -ninth 
street;  while  an  hourly  stage  on  the  Third  avenue,  just 
beyond,  afforded  our  readiest  means  of  transit  to  and  from  the 
city  proper."1 

Mr.  Greeley  had  become  so  accustomed  to  the  ceaseless 
noises  of  the  city,  that  the  stillness  of  his  new  home  was  at 
tirst  oppressive.  It  appeared  to  him  sepulchral,  unearthly, 
and  it  was  some  time  before  he  could  be  as  cheerful  in  his 
country  home  as  in  the  old  house  down  town,  or  the  one  on 
Broome  street.  It  was  here,  in  the  home  opposite  the  lower 
end  of  Blackwell's  Island,  that  Margaret  Fuller  for  a  long  time 
made  part  of  Mr.  Greeley 's  household.  She  says  of  it: 

This  place  is  to  me  entirely  charming;  it  is  so  completely  in  the 
country,  and  all  around  is  so  bold  and  free.  It  is  two  miles  or  more  from 
the  thickly  settled  parts  of  New- York,  but  omnibusses  and  cars  give  me 
constant  access  to  the  city,  and,  while  I  can  readily  see  what  and  whom  I 
will,  I  can  command  time  and  retirement.  Stopping  on  the  Harlem  road, 
you  enter  a  lane  nearly  a  quarter  of  a  mile  long,  and  going  by  a  small 
brook  and  pond  that  locks  in  the  place,  and  ascending  a  slightly  rising 
ground,  get  sight  of  the  house,  which,  old-fashioned  and  of  mellow  tint, 
fronts  on  a  flower  garden  filled  with  shrubs,  large  vines  and  trim  box 
borders.  On  both  sides  of  the  house  are  beautiful  trees,  standing  fair,  full- 
grown,  and  clear.  Passing  through  a  wide  hall  you  come  out  upon  a 
piazza,  stretching  the  whole  length  of  the  house,  where  one  can  walk  in 
all  weathers. 

She  thought  the  beauty  of  the  place  by  moonlight  was  fairly 
transporting.  "  I  enjoy  it  greatly,"  she  says,  "  and  the  genius 
loci  receives  me  as  to  a  home." 

This  place  continued  to  be  Mr.  Greeley's  home  for  some 
years.  But  he  had  a  house  in  the  city  for  a  considerable  period 
after  he  had  bought  the  Chappaqua  farm.  Mr.  Parton  in  his 
biography  publishes  a  letter  written  by  a  "Western  journalist  in 
the  winter  of  1853-'4,  descriptive  of  a  visit  at  Mr.  Greeley's 

1  Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life,  p.  176. 

.    V 


360          .    UFE  OF  nORACE  GREELEY. 

town  house,  which  gives  a  clear  insight  into  many  of  his  intel- 
lectual and  personal  habits  and  his  home  life.  This  writer 
says: 

"  In  point  of  pretension,  Horace  Greeley's  house  is  about  midway  between 
the  palaces  of  the  Fifth  Avenue  and  the  hovels  of  the  Five  Points.  It  is 
one  of  a  row  of  rather  small  houses,  two  and  a  half  stories  high,  built  of 
brick  and  painted  brown;  the  rent  of  which,  I  was  told,  is  likely  to  be 
about  seven  hundred  dollars  a  year.  It  was  a  chilly,  disagreeable  even- 
ing. I  went  early,  hoping  to  have  a  little  talk  with  the  editor  before  other 
company  should  arrive.  I  rang  the  bell  and  looked  through  the  pane  at 
the  side  of  the  door.  The  white  coat  was  not  upon  its  accustomed  peg, 
and  the  old  hat,  stuffed  with  newspapers,  was  not  in  its  usual  place  at  the 
bottom  of  the  hat-stand.  Therefore  I  knew  that  the  wearer  of  these  articles 
was  not  at  home,  before  the  girl  told  me  so ;  but  upon  her  informing  me 
that  he  was  expected  in  a  few  minutes,  I  concluded  to  go  in  and  wait. 
The  entrance-hall  is  exceedingly  narrow,  and  the  stairs,  narrower  still, 
begin  at  a  few  feet  from  the  door,  affording  room  only  for  the  hat-stand 
and  a  chair.  The  carpet  on  the  stairs  and  hall  was  common  in  pattern, 
coarse  in  texture.  A  lady  the  very  picture  of  a  prosperous  farmer's  wife, 
with  her  clean  delaine  dress  and  long,  wide  white  apron,  stood  at  the  head 
of  the  stairs,  and  came  down  to  meet  me.  She  lighted  the  gas  in  the 
parlours,  and  then,  summoned  by  the  crying  of  a  child  up  stairs,  left  me 
to  my  observations. 

"  Neither  I  nor  anybody  else  ever  saw  parlours  so  curiously  furnished. 
There  are  three  of  them,  and  the  inventory  of  the  furniture  would  read 
thus:  One  small  mahogany  table  at  the  head  of  the  front  parlour;  one 
lounge  in  ditto;  eleven  light  cane-chairs  in  front  and  back  parlours;  one 
book  case  of  carved  black  walnut,  in  the  small  apartment  behind  the  back 
parlour;  and,  except  the  carpets,  not  another  article  of  furniture  in  either 
room.  But  the  walls  were  almost  covered  with  paintings;  the  mantel- 
pieces were  densely  peopled  with  statuettes,  busts,  and  medallions;  in  a 
corner  on  a  pedestal  stood  a  beautiful  copy  of  Powers's  Proserpine  in 
marble ;  and  various  other  works  of  art  were  disposed  about  the  floor  or 
leaned  against  the  walls.  .  Of  the  quality  of  the  pictures  I  could  not,  in 
that  light,  form  an  opinion.  The  subjects  of  more  than  half  of  them  were 
religious,  such  as,  the  Virgin ;  Peter,  lovest  thou  me  ?  Christ  crowned 
with  thorns;  Mary,  Joseph  and  Child;  Virgin  and  Child;  a  woman  pray- 
ing before  an  image  in  a  Cathedral ;  Mary  praying ;  Hermit  and  skull ; 
and  others.  There  were  some  books  upon  the  table,  among  them  a  few 
annuals  containing  contributions  by  Horace  Greeley,  volumes  of  Burns, 
Byron,  and  Hawthorne,  Downing's  Rural  Essays,  West's  complete  analysis 
of  the  Holy  Bible,  and  Ballou's  Voice  of  Universalism. 

"  I  waited  an  hour.  There  came  a  double  and  decided  ring  at  the  bell. 
No  one  answered  the  summons.  Another  and  most  tremendous  ling 
brought  the  servant  to  the  door,  and  in  a  moment  the  face  of  the  master 
of  the  house  beamed  into  the  room.  He  apologized  thus:  'I  ought  to 


MB.    GREELEY   AT  HOME.  361 

have  been  here  sooner,  but  I  couldn't.'  lie  flung  off  his  overcoat,  hung  it 
up  in  the  hall,  and,  looking  into  the  parlour,  said,  'just  let  me  run  up  and 
see  iny  babies  one  minute ;  I  haven't  seen  'ern  all  day,  you  know ;'  and  he 
sprung  up  the  stairs  two  steps  at  a  time.  I  heard  him  talk  in  high  glee  to 
the  children  in  the  room  above  for  just  one  minute,  and  then  he  rejoined 
me.  He  began  to  talk  something  in  this  style : 

" '  Sit  down.  I  have  had  a  rough  day  of  it, — eaten  nothing  since  break- 
fast,— just  got  in  from  my  farm, — been  up  the  country  lecturing, — started 
from  Goshen  this  morning  at  five, — broke  down, — crossed  the  river  on  the 
ice, — had  a  hard  time  of  it, — ice  a  good  deal  broken  and  quite  dangerous, — 
lost  the  cars  on  this  side, — went  dogging  around  to  hire  a  conveyance, — 
got  to  Sing  Sing, — went  over  to  my  farm  and  transacted  my  business  there 
as  well  as  I  could  in  the  time, — started  for  the  city,  and  as  luck  would 
have  it,  they  had  taken  off  the  four  o'clock  train, — didn't  know  that  I 
should  get  down  at  all, — harnessed  up  my  own  team,  and  pushed  over  to 
Sing  Sing  again, — hadn't  gone  far  before  snap  went  the  whiffletree,— got 
another,  though,  and  reached  Sing  Sing  just  two  minutes  before  the  cars 
came  along, — I've  just  got  in, — my  feet  are  cold, — lets  go  to  the  fire.1 

"  With  these  words,  he  rose  quickly  and  went  into  the  back  room,  not 
to  the  fireplace,  but  to  a  corner  near  the  folding-door,  where  hot  air  gushed 
up  from  a  cheerless  round  hole  in  the  floor.  His  dress,  as  I  now  observed, 
amply  corroborated  his  account  of  the  day's  adventures, — shirt  all  crum- 
pled, cravat  all  awry,  coat  all  wrinkles,  stockings  about  his  heels,  and 
general  dilapidation. 

"  I  said  it  was  not  usual  at  the  West  to  go  Into  a  corner  to  warm  one's 
feet;  to  which  he  replied  by  quoting  some  verses  of  Holmes  which  I  did 
not  catch.  I  entreated  him  to  go  to  tea,  as  he  must  be  hungry,  but  he 
refused  '  pine  blank.'  The  conversation  fell  upon  poetry.  He  said  there 
was  one  more  book  he  should  like  to  make  before  he  died,  and  that  was  a 
Sony-Book  for  the  People.  There  was  no  collection  of  songs  in  existence 
which  satisfied  his  idea  of  what  a  popular  song-book  ought  to  be.  He 
would  like  to  compile  one  or  help  do  it.  He  said  he  had  written  verses 
himself,  but  was  no  poet;  and  bursting  into  a  prolonged  peal  of  laughter, 
he  added,  that  when  he  and  Park  Benjamin  were  editing  The  New-Yorker, 
he  wrote  some  verses  for  insertion  in  that  paper,  and  showed  them  to 
'  Park,'  and  '  Park '  roared  out, '  Thunder  and  lightning,  Greeley,  do  you  call 
t?tat poetry  ?'  Speaking  of  a  certain  well-known  versifier,  he  said:  '  He's  a 

good  fellow  enough,  but  he  can't  write  poetry,  and  if had  remained 

in  Boston,  he  would  have  killed  him,  he.takes  criticism  so  hard.  As  for 
me  I  like  a  little  opposition,  I  enjoy  it,  I  can't  understand  the  feelings  of 
those  thin-skinned  people. 

"  I  said  I  had  been  looking  to  see  what  books  he  preferred  should  lie  on 
his  table.  'I  don't  prefer,'  he  said;  'I  read  no  books.  I  have  been  trying 
for  years  to  get  a  chance  to  read  Wilhelm  Meister,  and  other  books.  Wat 
Goethe  a  dissolute  man  ?'  To  which  I  replied  with  a  sweeping  negative. 
This  led  the  conversation  to  biography,  and  he  remarked :  How  many 
utooden  biographies  there  are  about.  They  are  of  no  use.  There  are  not 


3G2  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GKEELEY. 

half  a  dozen  good  biographies  in  our  language.  You  know  what  Carlyle 
gays :  '  I  want  to  know  what  a  man  eats,  what  time  he  gets  up,  what 
colour  his  stockings  are.'  (His,  on  this  occasion,  were  white,  with  a  hole 
in  each  heel.)  'There's  no  use  in  any  man's  writing  a  biography  unless 
he  can  tell  what  no  one  else  can  tell.'  Seeing  me  glance  at  his  pictures, 
he  said  he  had  brought  them  from  Italy,  but  there  was  only  one  or  two  of 
them  that  he  boasted  of. 

"  A  talk  upon  politics  ensued.  He  said  he  had  enough  of  party  politics. 
He  would  speak  for  temperance,  and  labour,  and  agriculture,  and  some 
other  objects,  but  he  was  not  going  to  stump  the  country  any  more  to 
promote  the  interests  of  party  or  candidates.  In  alluding  to  political 
persons  he  used  the  utmost  freedom  of  vituperation,  but  there  was  such 
an  evident  absence  of  anger  and  bitterness  on  his  part,  that  if  the 
vituperated  individuals  had  overheard  the  conversation,  they  would  not 
have  been  offended,  but  amused.  Speaking  of  association,  he  said,  'Ah! 
our  workingmen  must  be  better  educated ;  we  must  have  better  schools ; 
they  must  learn  to  confide  in  one  another  more ;  then  they  will  associate.' 
Then,  laughing,  he  added,  '  If  you  know  anybody  afflicted  with  democracy, 
tell  him  to  join  an  association;  that  will  cure  him  if  anything  will;  still, 
association  will  triumph  in  its  day,  and  in  its  own  way.'  In  reply  to 
Q — 's  definition  of  "Webster  as  '  a  petty  man,  with  petty  objects,  sought  by 

petty  means,'  he  said, '  I  call  him  a ;  but  his  last  reply  to  Hayne  was 

the  biggest  speech  yet  made ;  it 's  only  so  long,'  pointing  to  a  place  on 
his  arm,  'but  it  is  very  great.'  Another  remark  on  another  subject  elicited 
from  him  the  energetic  assertion  that '  the  invention  of  the  key  was  the 
Devil's  masterpiece.'  Alluding  to  a  recent  paragraph  of  his,  I  said  I 
thought  it  the  best  piece  of  English  he  had  ever  written.  'No,'  he 
replied,  '  there  's  a  bad  repetition  in  it  of  the  word  sober  in  the  same 
sentence;  I  can  write  better  English  than  that.'  I  told  him  of  the  project 
of  getting  half  a  dozen  of  the  best  men  and  women  of  the  country  to 
join  in  preparing  a  series  of  school  reading-books.  He  said,  'They  would 
be  in  danger  of  shooting  over  the  heads  of  the  children.'  To  which  I 
replied,  'No;  it  is  common  men  who  do  that;  great  men  are  simple,  and 
akin  to  children.' 

"  A  little  child  four  years  old,  with  long  flaxen  hair  and  ruddy  cheeks, 
came  in  and  said,  '  Mother  wants  you  up  stairs.'  He  caught  it  up  in  his 
arms  with  every  manifestation  of  excessive  fondness,  saying,  '  No,  you 
rogue,  it 's  you  that  want  him;'  and  the  child  wiggled  out  of  his  arms  and 
ran  away. 

"As  I  was  going,  some  ladies  came  in,  and  I  remained  a  moment  longer 
at  his  request.  He  made  a  languid  and  quite  indescribable  attempt  at 
introduction,  merely  mentioning  the  names  of  the  ladies  with  a  faint  bob 
at  each.  One  of  them  asked  a  question  about  Spiritualism.  He  said, 
'  I  have  paid  no  attention  to  that  subject  for  two  years.  I  became  satisfied 
it  would  lead  to  no  good.  In  fact  I  am  so  taken  up  witli  the  things  of 
this  world,  that  I  have  too  little  time  to  spend  on  the  affairs  of  the  other.' 
She  said, '  A  distinction  ought  to  be  made  between  those  who  investigate 


IN  "FULL  DEESS."  363 

the  phenomena  as  phenomena,  and  those  who  embrace  them  fanatically.' 
'Yes,' said  he, 'I  have  no  objection  to  their  being  investigated  by  those 
•who  have  more  time  than  I  have.'  '  Have  you  heard,'  asked  the  lady,  '  of 
the  young  man  who  personates  Shakespeare  ?'  '  No,'  he  replied,  '  but  I 
am  satisfied  there  is  no  folly  it  will  not  run  into.'  Then  he  rose  and  said, 
'  Take  off  your  things  and  go  up  stairs.  I  must  get  some  supper,  for  I 
have  to  go  to  that  meeting  at  the  Tabernacle  to-night'  (anti-Nebraska). 

"As  I  passed  the  hat-stand  in  the  hall,  I  said, 'Here  is  that  immortal 
white  coat.'  He  smiled  and  said,  '  People  suppose  it 's  the  same  old  coat, 
but  it  isn't.'  I  looked  questioningly,  and  he  continued,  'The  original 
white  coat  came  from  Ireland.  An  emigrant  brought  it  out;  he  wanted 
money  and  1  wanted  a  coat ;  so  I  bought  it  of  him  for  twenty  dollars,  and 
it  was  the  best  coat  I  ever  had.  They  do  work  well  in  the  old  countries ; 
not  in  such  a  hurry  as  we  do.' 

"The  door  closed,  and  I  was  alone  with  the  lamp-post.  In  another 
hour,  Horace  Grccley,  after  such  a  day  of  hunger  and  fatigue,  was  speak- 
ing to  an  audience  of  three  thousand  people  in  the  Tabernacle." 

Mr.  Greeley  never  became  heartily  addicted  to  "  full  dress." 
The  last  time  the  writer  of  these  words  saw  him  was  in  1870, 
on  the  Capitol  steps  in  "Washington  City.  He  stopped  and 
talked  for,  perhaps,  half  an  hour,  though  the  day  was  broiling 
hot.  I  recollect  that  he  M-as  dressed  in  faultless  style,  and  of 
afterwards  remarking  to  Mr.  Hawkins  Taylor,  with  whom  he 
walked  up  the  avenue,  that  "Horace  Greeley  was  the  best 
dressed  man  I  had  seen  in  Washington."  His  cravat  was  not 
adjusted  precisely  in  the  mode,  his  hat  was  evidently  worn  as 
a  hat,  not  as  an  ornament,  and  his  boots  were  not  thin-soled; 
but  his  whole  toilet  was  that  of  careless  elegance,  befitting  a 
distinguished  gentleman,  who  spent  no  great  amount  of  time 
in  front  of  his  looking-glass.  The  many  thousands  who  have 
seen  him  on  lecturing  tours  and  on  other  occasions  when  he 
was  off  editorial  duty, — when  not  being  driven  before  the 
tempestuous  winds  of  his  busy  life, — can  scarcely  credit 
the  numerous  accounts  we  have  had  of  his  carelessness  as  to 
dress.  Yet  they  are  correct  in  the  main.  His  marching  suit 
was  not  the  same  as  that  he  wore  on  dress  parade  and  the 
grand  review.  And  it  is  certain  that  he  never  bestowed  much 
time  in  getting  himself  into  his  best  clothes,  Several  years 
before  his  death,  he  lectured  on  one  occasion  at  the  city  of 
Hamilton,  Ohio.  A  barber  was  sent  for  to  shave  him,  and  act 
as  temporary  valet  de  chambre,  by  whose  elaborate  labours 


364:  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

Mr.  Greeley  appeared  in  the  faultless  fashion  of  an  exquisite. 
lie  surveyed  himself  in  the  glass  a  moment,  and — exploded. 
Re-tying  his  cravat  and  jerking  his  standing  collar  about  with 
energy  of  manner  and  of  idium,  while  the  valet  vanished  out 
of  the  storm,  the  lecturer  appeared  in  due  time  with  his  wear- 
ing gear  a  little  awry  about  the  neck,  but  otherwise  without 
violation  of  the  mode.  He  has  been  seen  on  the  -streets  of 
New- York  wearing  a  coat  literally  out  at  elbows.  For  many 
years  of  his  life  he  was  absolutely  indifferent  as  to  his  dress, 
and  at  no  time  did  he  have  the  desire  or  the  patience  to  give 
special  attention  to  his  personal  appearance.  That  he  came  to 
be  a  passably  well-dressed  gentleman  on  occasions  when  not 
hard  at  work  is  a  fact  which  we  may  in  justice  rather  credit  to 
the  genius  of  his  tailor  than  his  own.  If  there  has  been  one 
man  who  gave  less  attention  to  his  toilet,  as  toilet,  than  any 
other,  that  man  was,  most  likely,  Horace  Greeley. 

And  yet  no  man  ever  lived  who  was  more  scrupulously 
clean.  He  believed  in  both  internal  and  external  applications 
of  cold  water.  His  usual  time  of  sleep,  in  bed,  was  five  or 
six  hours.  He  was  exceedingly  skilful  in  catching  naps 
where  rer  they  were  to  be  found, — at  church,  the  opera,  the 
theatre,  wherever  he  might  happen  to  be  with  nothing  of  his 
own  work  to  do.8  He  usually  retired  about  an  hour  after 
midnight,  and  arising  at  7  o'clock  in  the  morning,  the  first 
thing  in  order  always  was  a  vigorous  bath.  He  invariably, 
when  it  was  possible,  bathed  once  daily,  and  not  seldom  twice. 
Two  or  three  times  in  his  life  he  was  sorely  afflicted  with 
boils, — the  result,  doubtless,  of  over- work  and  over-bathing 

Mr.  Greeley  had  the  habit  of  vituperation.  He  was,  in 
language,  an  abusive  man.  This  habit  sometimes  broke  out 

*  Nevertheless,  Mr.  Greeley  seemed  to  be  asieep,  rather  tnan  actually 
slept,  on  such  occasions.  An  old  Washington  friend  of  his,  Mr.  E.  L.  Stevens, 
tells  me  that  he  often  saw  Mr.  Greeley  at  church  while  he  was  a  member 
of  Congress,  He  would  come  in,  enter  his  pew,  and  soon  be  apparently 
sound  asleep— eyes  closed,  and  his  whole  body  motionless,  except  the 
steady  breathing.  Mr.  Stevens  several  times  asked  Mr.  Greeley  what  he 
thought  of  the  sermon,  and  was  astonished  to  find  that  in  every  instance 
he  recapitulated  the  substance  of  the  whole  of  it  with  great  accuracy. 


u  VITUPERATION."  365 

in  his  editorials.  He  once  began  an  editorial:  "You  lie 
villain!  willfully,  wickedly,  basely  lie!"  This  was  in  reply  to 
an  article  in  a  respectable  newspaper.  In  a  letter  to  an  official 
of  the  State  of  New  York  he  dubbed  a  rival  editor  a  "  little 
villain."  Akin  to  this  was  his  profane  swearing.  It  is  at 
last  established  that  on  certain  great  occasions  of  wrath, 
George  Washington  exploded  with  bursts  of  profanity.  lie 
did  not  have  the  excuse  that  Mr.  Greeley  had;  for  Washington 
never  was  called  upon  to  read  what  printers  call  "dirty  proof." 
I  doubt  if  there  is  anything  so  exasperating  as  this.  It  is 
true  that  Mr.  Greeley  did  not  write  the  most  legible  hand  in 
the  world,  but  he  made  good  manuscript  for  a  printer.  His 
letters  were  awkwardly  made,  but  they  were  all  made ;  and  his 
punctuation  was  always  perfect.  A  short  study  of  his  writing 
should  have  made  any  bright  printer  able  to  put  it  into  type 
without  gross  blunders.  But  let  this  be  as  it  may,  the  manu- 
script was  perfectly  plain  to  Mr.  Greeley,  so  that  when  a  proof 
or  a  revise  came  to  him,  wherein  his  wisdom  was  metamor 
phosed  into  nonsense,  his  terse  expressions  into  horrible  plati- 
tudes, he  boiled  over.  I  think  the  Recording  Angel,  when  he 
charges  up  a  burst  of  profanity  against  an  editor,  and  then 
looks  upon  the  "dirty  proof"  which  brought  it  forth,  will 
erase  the  charge.  I  should,  if  I  were  the  Recording  Angel.  1 
would  let  him  off  on  the  easiest  possible  terms.  Having  thus 
acquired  the  habit,  in  a  way  which  entitles  it  to  so  much  palli- 
ation, Mr.  Greeley  sometimes  exploded  vigorously  when  ther 
was  no  foul  proof  to  tempt  him.3 

1  A  story  is  told, — and  with  substantial  truth,  as  I  know, — of  the  Hon. 
Thomas  W.  Clagett,  editor  of  The  Kookuk  (Iowa)  Daily  Constitution. 
Noted  for  his  public  spirit  and  generosity,  he  was  also  known  as  one  who 
made  a  free  use  of  the  energetic  idiurn.  Upon  one  occasion  a  friend 
lectured  him  on  the  subject,  concluding  a  lengthy  homily  with  eulogising 
Hon.  J.  B.  Howell,  then  Judge  Clagett's  rival  editor,  since  a  Senator  of  the 
United  States,  a  Commissioner  of  Southern  Claims,  and  ever  a^good  and 
noble  man  at  heart.  "There,"  said  the  lecturer,  "is  our  friend,  Brother 
Howell,  of  The  Gate  City.  He  not  only  does  not  swear,  but  he  is  a  Chris- 
tian man;  a  praying  man.  I  heard  him  make  an  excellent  prayer  at  the 
meeting  last  evening."  "Well,  well,  Sir,"  replied  the  Judge,  "there  is  not 
so  much  difference  between  Brother  Howell  and  me  as  you  think  there  is 
I  don't  mean  anything,  Sir,  by  my  swearing;  and  Brother  Howell  don't 
mean  anything  by  his  praying!" 


366  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

Mr.  Greeley's  vituperation  in  conversation  was  not  malig- 
nant. His  bark  \vas  "waur  than  his  bite."  Though  free 
from  malice  and  bad  hcartedncss, — entirely  so, — it  was  incon- 
sistent with  personal  dignity. 

Horace  Greeley  always  had  a  vigorous  appetite.  This  he 
exercised  at  home,  leaving  his  vigorous  language  to  be  exer- 
cised elsewhere.  13ut  lie  never  acquired  a  great  fondness  for 
rich  viands.  He  ate  to  live.  To  "How  are  you,  this  morning, 
Mr.  Greeley?"  he  would  reply,  "Stout,"  most  generally.  He 
ate  a  hearty  but  plain  breakfast  at  home,  but  usually  dined 
down  town  about  four  or  live  o'clock.  His  dinner  was  sub- 
stantial, eaten  with  astonishing  vigour  and  some  awkwardness 
of  manner,  finished  with  a  glass  of  cold  water.  He  detested 
state  dinners,  and  though  he  participated  in  many  such  festive 
occasions,  presiding  at  some  public  dinners  of  historic  interest, 
he  enjoyed  everything  else  better  than  the  viands.  It  is 
related  of  him  that  calling  to  visit  a  friend  one  evening,  he 
found  several  persons  in  the  parlour,  and  concluded  to  sit 
a  while,  though  he  had  not  yet  dined.  The  hostess  brought 
in  a  great  plate  filled  with  doughnuts  and  passed  it  to  Mr. 
Greeley.  Placing  the  plate  on  his  knees,  and  becoming 
intently  engaged  in  the  conversation,  he  ate  away  at  the 
doughnuts  until  the  last  one  had  vanished.  Though  he  had 
eaten  about  a  half-peck  of  concentrated  "richness"  and  lard, 
no  ill  result  followed.  The  hostess  thought  he  might  even 
have  safely  disposed  of  another  dish  full,  and  that  without 
knowing  it  himself. 

Excessive  devotion  to  hospitality  is  the  renowned  virtue  of 
Arabs  and  of  American  Indians.  It  is  impossible  for  men  of 
greatly  active  lives  to  squander  much  time  in  mere  amenities 
and  agreeabilities.  To  them  life  is  real,  life  is  earnest.  Hospi- 
tality abounds  most  among  those  who  have  others  to  labour 
for  thejn.  It  is,  indeed,  a  pleasant  rite;  and  the  one  thing 
most  needful  of  all  in  the  enjoyable  exercise  of  the  rite,  is  an 
elegant  cook  of  versatile  genius  and  accomplishments.  And 
this  must  be  in  the  person  of  the  female  head  of  the  house- 
hold. Otherwise  some  things  will  go  wrong  in  some  way  or 
at  some  place  between  the  kitchen  and  the  dining-room.  Mrs. 


IHS   LOVE   OF   CniLDKEN.  367 

Greeley  was  not  a  versatile  and  accomplished  cook.  She  might 
have  been,  no  doubt;  for  in  a  matter  of  so  much  importance 
as  civilized  eating.  Providence  lias  wisely  ordained  that  one 
may  become  a  great  cook  simply  by  putting  one's  mind  to  it. 
A  hundredth  part  of  the  time  given  by  American  ladies  quite 
generally  to  the  study  of  the  subject  of  their  head-gear  would 
enable  every  one  to  direct  the  cooking  of  an  excellent  breakfast 
or  dinner.  Mrs.  Greeley's  principles  upon  the  subject  of  food 
prevented  her  from  becoming  popular  as  a  dispenser  of  hospi- 
tality, though  she  never  was  devoted  to  external  head-gear. 
And  it  hence  happened  that  Mr.  Greeley  never  became  cele- 
brated for  the  excellence  of  his  dinners.  Such  hospitality  as 
he  dispensed  was  from  a  frugal  board,  but  the  guest  was  gener- 
ously welcomed  and  most  kindly  and  unaffectedly  entertained. 
Such  natural  welcome,  such  homely  entertainment  might  Cin- 
cinnatus  have  extended  to  the  visiting  citizens  of  Rome  whose 
homes  he  had  saved  from  sack  and  pillage.  If  Mr.  Greeley's 
hospitality,  during  many  years,  was  not  great  in  the  dining 
rooms,  it  was  ever  great,  genial,  and  most  agreeable  in  the 
drawing-rooms. 

One  of  his  most  beautiful  characteristics,  ever  spreading 
sunshine  and  warmth  throughout  his  home,  was  his  tender 
love  of  his  children.  He  had  a  warm  side  in  his  nature  for 
all  children,  and  could  not  see  one  in  sorrow  without  being 
visibly  affected,  "  O,  poor  little  fellow!"  he  would  say  to  some 
crying  urchin  on  Broadway,  who  had  been  hurt  or  imposed 
upon,  "go  buy  what  you  want  with  that,"  handing  him  a 
liberal  gift. 

But  at  home  with  his  own  children,  he  was  himself  a  child 
again, — simple,  joyous,  playful,  rolicking.  I  suppose  he  never 
was  angry  with  a  child  in  all  his  life.  As  he  was  so  intensely 
devoted  to  his  children,  so  were  they  most  devotedly  attached 
to  him.  They  always  took  liberties  with  him.  He  wept  with 
them  when  they  wept,  and  rejoiced  when  they  rejoiced.  The 
early  death  of  all  but  two  of  his  children  cast  an  unending 
shadow  upon  his  soul,  but  intensified  to  a  degree  almost  super- 
natural his  affection  for  the  two  daughters  who  survived  him. 

If  there  is  anything  in  English  literature  more  touching, 


368  MFE  OF  HORACE  GEEELEY. 

more  beautiful,  more  reverential ;  more  demonstrative  of 
tenderness  and  benignity  of  soul,  than  his  account  of  his  own 
family  dead,  I  have  never  seen  it.  The  man  who  can  read  the 
account  of  the  death  of  "Pickie"  without  emotion,  is  greatly 
to  be  pitied.  Let  me  sanctity  this  volume  with  Mr.  Greeley's 
own  description:4 

My  son,  Arthur  Young  ("  Pickio  "),  born  in  March,  1844,  was  the  third 
of  seven  children,  whereof  a  son  and  daughter,  severally  born  in  1838  and 
in  1843,  scarcely  opened  their  eyes  to  a  world  which  they  entered  but  to 
leave.  Physically,  they  were  remarkable  for  their  striking  resemblance  in 
hair  and  features  to  their  father  and  mother  respectively. 

Arthur  had  points  of  similarity  to  each  of  us,  but  with  decided  superior- 
ity, as  a  whole,  to  either.  I  looked  in  vain  through  Italian  galleries,  two 
years  after  he  was  taken  from  us,  for  any  full  parallel  to  his  dazzling 
beauty, — a  beauty  not  physical  merely,  but  visibly  radiating  from  the 
soul.  His  hair  was  of  the  finest  and  richest  gold;  "the  sunshine  of  pic- 
ture "  never  glorified  its  equal ;  and  the  delicacy  of  his  complexion  at  once 
fixed  the  attention  of  observers  like  the  late  N.  P.  Willis,  who  had 
traversed  both  hemispheres  without  having  his  gaze  arrested  by  any  child 
who  could  bear  a  comparison  with  this  one.  Yet  he  was  not  one  of  those 
paragons  sometimes  met  with,  whose  idlest  chatter  would  edify  a  Sunday 
school, — who  never  do  or  say  aught  that  propriety  would  not  sanction 
and  piety  delight  in,  — but  thoroughly  human,  and  endued  with  a  love  of 
play  and  mischief  which  kept  him  busy  and  happy  the  livelong  day, 
while  rendering  him  the  delight  and  admiration  of  all  around  him.  The 
arch  delicacy  wherewith  he  inquiringly  suggested,  when  once  told  a  story 
that  overtaxed  his  credulity,  "  I  'pose  that  aint  a  lie  ?"  was  characteristic 
of  his  nature.  Once,  when  about  three  years  old,  having  chanced  to  espy 
my  watch  lying  on  a  sofa  as  I  was  dressing  one  Sunday  morning,  with  no 
third  person  present,  he  made  a  sudden  spring  of  several  feet,  caught  the 
watch  by  the  chain,  whirled  it  around  his  head,  and  sent  it  whizzing 
against  the  chimney,  shattering  its  face  into  fragments.  "  Pickie,"  I 
inquired,  rather  sadly  than  angrily,  "how  could  you  do  me  such  injury?" 
"  'Cause  I  was  nervous,"  he  regretfully  replied.  There  were  ladies  then 
making  part  of  our  household  whose  nerves  were  a  source  of  general  aa 
well  as  personal  discomfort;  and  this  was  his  attestation  of  the  fact. 

There  were  wiser  and  deeper  sayings  treasured  as  they  fell  from  his  lips; 
but  I  will  not  repeat  them.  Several  yet  live  who  remember  the  graceful 
gayety  wherewith  he  charmed  admiring  circles  assembled  at  our  house, 
and  at  two  or  three  larger  gatherings  of  friends  of  Social  Reform  in  this 
city,  and  at  the  N.  A.  Phalanx  in  New  Jersey;  and  I  think  some  grave 
seigniors,  who  were  accustomed  to  help  us  enjoy  our  Saturday  afternoons 
in  our  rural  suburban  residence  at  Turtle  Bay,  were  drawn  thither  as 
much  by  their  admiration  of  the  son  as  by  their  regard  for  his  parents. 

4  Itecollections  of  a  Busy  Life,  p.  426,  et  seq. 


DEATH   OF   "PICKEE." 

Meantime,  another  daughter  was  given  to  us,  and,  after  six  months, 
•withdrawn ;  and  still  another  born,  who  yet  survives ;  and  he  had  run  far 
into  his  sixth  year  without  one  serious  illness.  His  mother  had  devoted 
herself  to  him  from  Jiis  birth,  even  beyond  her  intense  consecration  to 
the  care  of  her  other  children;  had  never  allowed  him  to  partake  of 
animal  food,  or  to  know  that  an  animal  was  ever  killed  to  be  eaten ;  had 
watched  and  tended  him  with  absorbing  love,  till  the  perils  of  infancy 
seemed  fairly  vanquished ;  and  we  had  reason  to  hope  that  the  light  of 
our  eyes  would  be  spared  to  gladden  our  remaining  years. 

It  was  otherwise  decreed.  In  the  Summer  of  1849,  the  Asiatic  cholera 
suddenly  reappeared  in  our  city,  and  the  frightened  authorities  ordered 
all  swine,  etc.,  driven  out  of  town,  —  that  is,  above  Fortieth  street, — 
whereas  our  home  was  about  Forty-eighth  street,  though  no  streets  had 
yet  been  cut  through  that  quarter.  At  once,  and  before  we  realized  our 
danger,  the  atmosphere  was  polluted  by  the  exhalations  of  the  swinish 
multitude  thrust  upon  us  from  the  densely  peopled  hives  south  of  us,  and 
the  cholera  claimed  its  victims  by  scores  before  we  were  generally  aware 
of  its  presence. 

Our  darling  was  among  the  first;  attacked  at  1  A.  M.  of  the  12th  of  July, 
when  no  medical  attendance  was  at  hand;  and  our  own  prompt,  unre- 
mitted  efforts,  reenforced  at  length  by  the  best  medical  skill  within  reach, 
availed  nothing  to  stay  the  fury  of  the  epidemic,  to  which  he  succumbed 
about  5  P.  M.  of  that  day,  —  one  of  the  hottest,  as  well  as  quite  the  longest, 
I  have  ever  known.  He  was  entirely  sans  and  conscious  till  near  the  last; 
insisting  that  he  felt  little  or  no  pain  and  was  well,  save  that  we  kept  him 
sweltering  under  clothing  that  he  wanted  to  throw  off,  as  he  did  whenever 
he  was  permitted.  When  at  length  the  struggle  ended  with  his  last 
breath,  and  even  his  mother  was  convinced  that  his  eyes  would  never* 
again  open  on  the  scenes  of  this  world,  I  knew  that  the  Summer  of  ray 
life  was  over,  that  the  chill  breath  of  its  Autumn  was  at  hand,  and  that 
my  future  course  must  be  along  the  downhill  of  life. 

Yet  another  son  (Raphael  Uhland)  was  born  to  us  two  years  afterward; 
who,  though  more  like  his  father  and  less  like  a  poet  than  Arthur,  was 
quite  as  deserving  of  parental  love,  though  not  eo  eninently  fitted  t-> 
evoke  and  command  general  admiration.  He  was  \vith  me  in  France  and 
Switzerland  in  the  Summer  of  1855 ;  spending,  with  his  mother  and-  sister, 
the  previous  Winter  in  London  and  that  subsequent  in  Dresden ;  returning 
with  them  in  May,  '56,  to  fall  a  victim  to  the  croup  the  ensuing  February. 
I  was  absent  on  a  lecturing  tour  when  apprise^  of  his  dangerous  illness, 
and  hastened  home  to  find  that  he  had  died  an  hour  before  my  arrival, 
though  he  had  hoped  and  striven  to  av/ait  my  return.  He  had  fulfilled 
his  sixth  year  and  twelve  days  over  when  our  home  wac  again  made 
desolate  by  his  death. 

Another  daughter  ,vas  born  to  us  four  weeks  later,  who  survives;  so  thai 
we  have  reason  to  be  grateful  for  two  children  left  to  soothe  our  decline, 
as  well  as  for  five  who,  having  prereloc  'i'  on  the  long  journey,  await  ua 
vn  the  Land  of  Souls. 

24 


370  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

My  life  has  been  busy  and  anxious,  but  not  joyless.  Whether  it  shall 
tee  prolonged  few  or  more  years,  I  am  grateful  that  it  has  endured  so  long, 
and  that  it  has  abounded  in  opportunities  for  good  not  wholly  unim- 
proved, and  in  experiences  of  the  nobler  as  well  as  the  baser  impulses  of 
human  nature.  I  have  been  spared  to  see  the  end  of  giant  wrongs,  which 
I  once  deemed  invincible  in  this  century,  and  to  note  the  silent  upspring- 
ing  and  growth  of  principles  and  influences  which  I  hail  as  destined  to 
root  out  some  of  the  most  flagrant  and  pervading  evils  that  yet  remain. 
I  realize  that  each  generation  is  destined  to  confront  new  and  peculiar 
perils,  —  to  wrestle  with  temptations  and  seductions  unknown  to  its  pre- 
decessors; yet  I  trust  that  progress  is  a  general  law  of  our  being,  and 
that  the  ills  and  woes  of  the  future  shall  be  less  crushing  than  those  of 
the  bloody  and  hateful  past.  So,  looking  calmly,  yet  humbly,  for  that 
close  of  my  mortal  career  which  cannot  be  far  distant,  I  reverently  thank 
God  for  the  blessings  vouchsafed  me  in  the  past ;  and,  with  an  awe  that 
is  not  fear,  and  a  consciousness  of  demerit  which  does  not  exclude  hope, 
await  the  opening  before  my  steps  of  the  gates  of  the  Eternal  World. 

Mr.  Greeley's  taste  as  to  home  adornments  has  been  indicated 
in  the  preceding  pages.  He  cared  little,  perhaps  nothing, 
for  display.  His  furniture  was  not  of  the  finest.  But  in  his 
European  travels,  he  had  met  with  paintings  and  sculptures 
which  he  liked,  and  though  inclined  to  "bare walls,"  his  home 
became  somewhat  crowded  with  paintings  and  statuary.  lie 
had  a  number  of  really  excellent  paintings,  and  a  statuette  or 
two  by  Powers,  with  many  another  gem  of  beauty  in  art. 
There  was  a  rustic  air  ever  about  Mr.  Greeley's  home;  an  air 
01  rustic  elegance.  Thers  was  the  sweet,  pure,  wholesome 
zephyrs  of  the  country  murmuring  evermore  through  apart- 
ments cf  unostentious  refinement  and  the  beautiful  simplicity 
of  the  elder  time. 

Indeed,  Mr.  Parton  in  his  biography  remarks  with  great 
truth,  that  in  manner  Mr.  Greeley  continued  to  be  a  rustic; 
that  the  metropolis  had  been  able  to  make  only  little  impres- 
sion upon  him;  and  that  he  lived  amid  the  million  of  his 
fellow-citizens,  in  their  various  uniforms,  an  unassimilated 
man.  Mer  of  the  world, — happily  named,  for  they  aie  invaria- 
Dly  at  bottom  of  th^  earth  earthy, — mtn  of  the  world  are 
never  unsophisticated.  I  think  they  call  it  "  green.''  Wise 
men  are  al'vays  ''green,"  -nd  often  fail  to  "ripen  ''  during  the 
whole  course  of  their  /jvej  Socrates  sobor  and  Alcibiades 


GREEN        MLX. 


371 


drunk,  would  be  a  fine  picture  and  an  instructive.  Men  of 
the  world  would  inevitably  take  off  their  hats  to  the  wrong 
man.  Carlyle  was  wise,  but  it  was  very  "  green "  in  him  to 
say  that  "  courtesy  is  the  due  of  man  to  man,  not  of  suit-of- 
clothes  to  suit-of-clothes." 

Horace  Greeley  was  "green."  As  we  have  quoted  from  ]\Jr. 
Parton,  he  lived  in  a  city  of  a  million  souls  an  unassimilated 
man.  In  many  respects  city  life  rasped  harshly,  almost  cruelly, 
upon  his  nature.  It  was  something  like  undertaking  to  make 
Rob  Roy  stamp  a  Broadway  pavement,  exclaiming,  "I  tread 
my  native  heath,  and  my  name  is  MacGregor!"  He  longed 
for  the  free  air,  the  green  woods, — for  room  in  which  to 
breathe  freely.  Nothing  could  have  been  more  natural,  there- 
fore, or  a  more  proper  tiling  for  him  to  do,  than  to  become  a 
farmer.  Accordingly,  he  bought  a  farm. 


DR.  CHARLES   H.  RAY.— See  page  339. 


CHAPTEE   XXI. 

HORACE  GREELEY,  THE  FARMER 

His  Love  of  Rural  Life  — But  Not  of  Ox-Life  — His  Wife's  Judgment 
Principally  Consulted  as  to  The  Farm  Site  —  Cbappaqua  —  A  Descrip- 
tion of  the  Place  — The  First  Forest  Home  There  —  Mr.  Greeley's  Mode 
of  Improving  the  Place  —  His  Practical  farming  —  The  Later  Home 
—  General  Facts  as  to  his  Farmer-Life  —  His  Work  Entitled  "  What  I 
Know  of  Farming"  —  The  Subject  of  Innumerable  Jests  — Their 
Effect  Upon  Him. 

"  I  SHOULD  have  been  a  farmer,"  says  Mr.  Greeley.  "  All 
my  riper  tastes  incline  to  that  blessed  calling  whereby  the 
human  family  and  its  humbler  auxiliaries  are  fed.  Its  quiet, 
its  segregation  from  strife,  and  brawls,  and  heated  rivalries, 
attract  and  delight  me."  And  he  goes  on  to  say  that,  though 
content  with  his  lot,  and  grateful  for  the  generosity  wherewith 
his  labours  had  been  rewarded,  yet  would  he  choose  to  earn 
his  bread  by  cultivating  the  soil,  were  he  to  begin  life  anew. 
"Blessed  is  he,"  he  exclaims,  "whose  day's  exertion  ends  with 
the  evening  twilight,  and  who  can  sleep  unbrokenly  and  with- 
out anxiety  till  the  dawn  awakens  him,  with  energies  renewed 
and  senses  brightened,  to  fresh  activity  and  that  fulness  of 
health  and  vigour  which  are  vouchsafed  to  those  only  who 
spend  most  of  their  waking  hours  in  the  free,  pure  air  and 
renovating  sunshine  of  the  open  country."1 

Mr.  Greeley  thus  thought,  in  1868,  when  these  words  were 
written,  that  he  not  only  should  have  been  a  farmer,  on  account 
of  abounding  love  of  rural  life,  but  he  also  asserted  that  he 
would  have  devoted  his  life  to  that  calling,  had  any  science  of 
farming  been  known  to  those  among  whom  his  earlier  boy 
hood  was  passed.     Whilst  he  loved  the  country, — was  passion 
ately  devoted  to  it,  in  fact, — he  fairly  loathed,  as  we  have  seer 
in  the  early  part  of  his  work,  the  mindless  pursuit  of  farming 

1  Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life,  p.  295. 


BUT8  A  FARM.  373 

as  farming  was  wlien  he  was  a  boy.  It  was,  he  long  afterwards 
said,  a  work  for  oxen;  and  for  him  the  life  of  an  ox  had  no 
charm«.  He  had  abandoned  farm  life  because,  though  he  had 
perceived  all  there  was  in  the  farmer's  calling,  as  then  con- 
ducted, he  had  not  really  learned  much  more  of  it,  as  it  should 
be,  "  than  a  good  plough-horse  ought  to  understand." 

It  was  a  quarter  of  a  century  after  he  gave  up  farm  life  to 
learn  the  trade  of  a  printer,  that  he  felt  able  to  buy  a  farm. 
Earlier  than  this  he  had  been  a  small  farmer  on  his  rented 
place  of  some  eight  acres  opposite  Blaekwell's  Island,  herein- 
before described.  While  on  this  little  farm,  he  says  that  "  one 
fine  Spring  morning,  a  neighbour  called  and  offered  to  plough 
for  $5  my  acre  of  tillage  not  cut  up  by  rows  of  box  and  other 
shrubs ;  and  I  told  him  to  go  ahead.  I  came  home  next  even- 
ing, just  as  he  was  finishing  the  job,  which  I  contemplated 
most  ruefully.  His  plough  was  a  pocket  edition;  his  team  a 
single  horse;  his  furrows  at  most  five  inches  deep.  I  paid 
him,  but  told  him  plainly  that  I  would  have  preferred  to  give 
the  money  for  nothing.  He  insisted  that  he  had  ploughed  for 
me  as  he  had  ploughed  for  others  all  around  me.  '  I  will  tell 
you,'  I  rejoined,  '  exactly  how  this  will  work.  Throughout 
the  Spring  and  early  Summer,  we  shall  have  frequent  rains  and 
moderate  heat:  thus  far  my  crops  will  do  well.  But  then  will 
come  hot  weeks,  with  little  or  no  rain;  and  they  will  dry  up 
this  shallow  soil  and  everything  planted  thereon.'  The  result 
signally  justified  my  prediction.  We  had  frequent  rains  and 
cloudy,  mild  weather,  till  the  1st  of  "July,  when  the  clouds 
vanished,  the  sun  came  out  intensely  hot,  and  we  had  scarcely 
a  sprinkle  till  the  1st  of  September,  by  which  time  my  corn 
and  potatoes  had  about  given  up  the  ghost."  2 

The  fancy  farming  at  Turtle  Bay  gave  way  to  city  life  again, 
and  the  famous  Chappaqua  farm,  his  final  and  successful 
venture,  was  bought  in  1853.  The  purchase  of  this  property 
is  thus  described  by  Mr.  Greeley  himself: 

The  choice  was  substantially  directed  by  my  wife,  who  said  that  sht 
insisted  on  but  three  requisites,  —  1.  A  peerless  spring  of  pure,  soft,  living 

•  What  I  know  of  Farming,  pp.  87-8. 


374  LIFE   OF   HORACE   OKEELEV. 

water;  2.  A  cascade  or  brawling  brook;  3.  "Woods  largely  composed  of 
evergreens.  These  may  seem  light  matters ;  yet  I  was  some  time  in  finding 
them  grouped  on  the  same  small  plat,  within  reasonable  distance  from  the 
city. 

I  did  find  them,  however;  and  those  who  object  to  my  taste  in  choosing 
for  my  home  a  rocky,  wooded  hillside,  sloping  to  the  north  of  west,  with 
a  bog  at  its  foot,  cannot  judge  me  fairly,  unless  they  consider  the  above 
requirements. 

My  land  was  previously  the  rugged,  mainly  wooded,  outskirt  of  two 
adjacent  farms,  whereof  my  babbling  brook  formed  the  boundary. 

Nine  miles  above  White  Plains,  and  thirty-five  N.  N.  E.  of  our  City  Hall, 
the  Harlem  Railroad,  when  nearly  abreast  of  the  village  of  Sing-Sing,  and 
six  miles  east  of  it,  just  after  entering  the  township  of  Newcastle,  crosses 
a  quite  small,  though  pretty  constant,  mill-stream,  named  by  the  Indians 
Cliappaqua,  which  is  said  to  have  meant  falling  or  babbling  water,  and 
which,  here  running  to  the  southeast,  soon  takes  a  southwesterly  turn, 
recrosses  under  the  railroad,  and  finds  its  way  into  the  Hudson,  through 
the  Sawmill  or  Nepperhan  creek,  at  Yonkers.  A  highway,  leading  west- 
ward  to  Sing-Sing,  crosses  the  railroad,  just  north  of  the  upper  crossing 
of  the  brook,  and  gives  us,  some  twenty  rods  from  the  northwest  corner 
.  of  my  farm,  a  station  and  a  post-office,  which,  with  our  modest  village  of 
twenty  or  thirty  houses,  take  their  name  from  our  mill-stream.  Chap- 
paqua  is  not  a  very  liquid  trisyllable,  but  there  is  comfort  in  the  fact  that 
it  is  neither  Clinton  nor  Washington,  nor  Middletown,  nor  any  of  the  trite 
appellations  which  have  so  often  been  reapplied,  that  half  the  letters 
intended  for  one  of  them  are  likely  to  bring  up  at  some  other.  (How  can 
a  rational  creature  be  so  thoughtless  as  to  date  his  letter  merely  "Green- 
field," or  "  Jackson,"  or  "  Springfield,"  and  imagine  that  the  stranger  ho 
addresses  can  possibly  guess  whither  to  mail  the  answer  ?) 

My  brook  has  its  source  in  wooded,  granite  hills,  on  the  east  southeast, 
and  comes  tinkling  or  brawling  thence  to  be  lost  in  the  Chappaqua,  a  few 
rods  south  of  the  road  to  Pleasantville,  which  forms  ray  southwestern 
boundary.  As  to  springs,  there  are  not  less  than  a  dozen,  which  no  drouth 
exhausts,  breaking  out  along  the  foot  of  my  hill,  or  at  the  base  of  a  higher 
ridge  which  forms  its  crest. 

My  woods  are  the  pride  of  the  farm,  which  without  them  would  never 
have  been  my  farm.  They  cover  about  twenty-five  of  the  seventy-five  acres 
which  compose  it;  and  I  say  to  them,  with  Oriental  courtesy,  and  more 
than  Oriental  sincerity,  "May  your  shadow  never  be  less!"  For  the 
ground  they  cover  is  in  good  part  an  irregular,  sideling  granite  ledge,  or 
portions  of  a  ledge,  thinly  covered  by  a  granitic,  gravelly  soil,  which 
could  not  be  made  to  grow  anything  but  wood  to  the  profit  of  the  grower; 
whereas,  it  grows  wood  better  than  a  rich  Illinois  or  Kansas  prairie  often 
condescends  to  do.  Its  trees  are  mainly  Hemlock  and  Red  Cedar  (my 
evergreens);  While  and  Red  Oak,  Whitewood,  Chestnut,  White  and  Blue 
Beech,  Dogwood,  White  Ash,  Sugar  and  Soft  Maple,  Elm,  Hickory,  Tulip, 
Butternut,  Black,  Yellow,  and  White  Birch.  There  were  just  two  treea 


375 

that  I  could  not  name,  after  twenty  years'  absorption  in  the  city ;  one  of 
them  is  known  as  Pepperidge,  the  other  as  Yellow  Poplar.  There  were  a 
good  many  wild  Black  Cherries :  but  these  I  have  nearly  exterminated,  as 
they  breed  caterpillars  to  infest  my  Apple-trees.  Of  shrubs,  there  are 
many  that  I  cannot  name.  Witch  Hazel,  Bunch  Willow,  Choke  Cherry, 
Hazel,  Sassafras,  and  Sumac,  are  among  those  that  I  readily  recognized. 
Swamp  Alder  infested  the  springy,  rocky,  boggy  ground  at  the  foot  of  one 
of  my  hills,  till  I  extirpated  it,  and  the  Dogwood  is  marked  for  speedy 
destruction.  It  beautifies — nay,  glorifies — the  woods  while  in  blossom  for 
a  week  or  so  early  in  May ;  but  it  is  of  no  account  as  timber,  while  it  sows 
its  seed  everywhere,  and  tends  to  monopolize  a  good  deal  more  ground 
than  it  will  pay  for. 

My  first  care,  on  getting  possession  of  my  farm,  was  to  shut  cattle  out 
of  the  greater  part  of  the  woods,  where  they  had  been  free  to  roam  and 
ravage  throughout  the  two  preceding  centuries  that  this  region  had  felt 
the  presence  of  civilized  man.  Pasturing  woods  is  one  of  the  most  glaring 
vices  of  our  semi-barbarian  agriculture.  Cattle  browse  the  tender  twigs 
of  delicate,  valuable  young  trees,  while  they  leave  the  coarse  and  worthless 
unscathed.  I  have,  to-day,  ten  times  as  many  of  the  Sugar  Maple,  White 
Ash,-etc.,  coming  on  in  my  woods  as  there  were  when  I  bought  and  shut 
the  cattle  out  of  them. 

I  have  no  blind  horror  of  cutting  trees.  Any  fairly  grown  forest  can 
always  spare  trees,  and  be  benefitted  by  their  removal.  But  I  protest  most 
earnestly  against  the  reckless  waste  involved  in  cutting  oft'  and  burning 
over  our  forests.  In  regions  which  are  all  woods,  ground  must  of  course 
be  cleared  for  cultivation;  but  many  a  farmer  goes  on  slashing  and  burn- 
ing  long  after  he  should  halt  and  begin  to  be  saving  of  his  timber.  Many 
of  our  dairymen  are  beginning  to  say,  "  Down  with  the  rest  of  our  woods ! 
we  can  buy  all  the  coal  we  need  for  fuel,  with  half  the  butter  and  cheese 
vre  can  make  on  our  lands  now  covered  with  wood."  Friends,  that  is  a 
sad  miscalculation.  With  one-fourth  of  your  land  in  wood,  judiciously 
covering  the  crests  of  your  ridges,  the  sides  of  your  ravines,  your  farms 
will  grow  more  grass  than  if  wholly  denuded  and  laid  bare  to  the  scorch- 
ing  sun.  Protracted,  desolating  drouths,  bleak,  scathing  winds,  and  the 
failure  of  delicate  fruits  like  the  Peach  and  finer  Pears,  are  part  of  the 
penalty  we  pay  for  depriving  our  fields  and  gardens  of  the  genial,  hospi- 
table protection  of  forests. 

Of  tree-planting,  other  than  for  fruit,  I  have  as  yet  done  little.  A  row 
of  Rock  Maples  along  the  highways  that  skirt  my  farm,  and  a  clump  of 
evergreens  just  north  of  my  garden,  are  nearly  all  I  have  to  show.  Any 
one  can  grow  Sugar  Maples  who  will  try.  To  prove  it,  I  need  only  say 
that  I  have  lost  but  two  in  over  a  hundred,  and  these  by  accident,  though 
my  trees  mainly  came  from  Rochester,  were  opened  on  a  warm,  sunny 
day,  and  left  thus  with  their  roots  exposed  till  thoroughly  dry.  1  came 
upon  the  planter  just  then,  and  told  him  he  had  killed  the  trees;  but  I 
was  mistaken.  I  would,  however,  advise  no  one  to  try  the  experiment  of 
drying  the  roots  of  trees  while  transplanting  them ;  but  if  he  will  be  BO 


376 


LIFE  OF  HORACE   GREELEY. 


careless,  he  may  better  take  the  risk  on  the  Sugar  Maple  than  on  any  other 
tree  within  my  knowledge. 

As  there  is  a  stout  hill  just  south  of  my  farm,  my  lower  land  is  over- 
shadowed  by  hills  in  the  two  wrong  directions,  and  so  inclines  to  be  cold. 
Just  north  of  where  my  brook  dances  out  of  the  glen  which  it  has  worn 


THE   CLUMP   OF   KVKUUltlkKMi. 


down  the  face  of  the  hill  is  my  garden,  with  a  slight  elevation  or  ridge 
just  north  of  it. 

This  low  ridge  I  have  planted  with  evergreens,  as  a  shelter  or  wind-break 
for  the  garden.  Part  of  them  are  Hemlocks  and  lied  Cedars,  transplanted 
from  the  woods  just  at  hand ;  perhaps  as  many  are  Norway  and  other 
Pines,  with  Balsam  and  other  Firs,  obtained  .from  nurseries.  These  latter 
have  the  more  luxuriant  growth,  but  all  have  done  well ;  and  the  copse 
or  clump — possibly  forty  rods  in  length  by  three  or  four  in  width — is  (at 
ieast  in  Winter)  the  pleasautest  object  seen  on  the  farm.  The  little  green- 
house which  nestles  beneath  it  is  flanked  by  strawberry  beds,  a  few  grape- 
vines, and  room  for  early  vegetables,  which,  sloping  gently  southward, 
enjoy  an  average  temperature  several  degrees  higher  than  they  would  if 
the  evergreens  were  away ;  and  the  acre  or  so  of  level  garden  farther  south 
is  also,  but  less  considerably,  warmed  and  sheltered  by  this  belt  of  ever- 
greens, which  not  only  verifies  Shelley's  apothegm,  that  "A  thing  of 
beauty  is  a  joy  forever,"  but  is  a  positive  reinforcement  to  the  productive 
capacity  of  the  farm.  * 

1  Recollections  of  a  Busjr  Life,  p.  29C,  et  teg. 


A  HOME  IN  THE  WOODS.  377 

A  little  farther  on  he  describes  how  he  worked  among  his 
trees  in  a  manner  which  is  at  the  same  time  interesting,  instruc- 
tive, and  droll: 

The  woods  arc  my  special  department.  Whenever  I  can  save  a  Saturday 
for  the  farm,  I  try  to  give  a  good  part  of  it  to  my  patch  of  forest.  The  axe 
is  the  healthiest  implement  that  man  ever  handled,  and  is  especially  so  for 
habitual  writers  and  other  sedentary  workers,  whose  shoulders  it  throws 
back,  expanding  their  chests,  and  opening  their  lungs.  If  every  youth 
and  man,  from  fifteen  to  fifty  years  old,  could  wield  an  axe  two  hours  per 
day,  dyspepsia  would  vanish  from  the  earth,  and  rheumatism  become 
decidedly  scarce.  I  am  a  poor  chopper;  yet  the  axe  is  my  doctor  and 
delight.  Its  use  gives  the  mind  just  enough  occupation  to  prevent  ita 
falling  into  revery  or  absorbing  trains  of  thought,  while  every  muscle  in 
the  body  receives  sufficient,  yet  not  exhausting,  exercise.  I  wish  all  our 
boys  would  learn  to  love  the  axe. 

I  began  by  cutting  out  the  Witch  Hazels,  and  other  trash  not  worth 
keeping,  and  trimming  up  my  trees,  especially  the  Hemlocks,  which  grow 
limbs  clear  to  the  ground,  and  throw  them  out  horizontally  to  such  a  dis- 
tance that  several  rods  of  ground  are  sometimes  monopolized  by  a  single 
tree.  Many  of  these  lower  limbs  die  in  the  course  of  time,  but  do  not  fall 
off;  on  the  contrary,  they  harden  and  sharpen  into  spikes,  which  threaten 
your  face  and  eyes  as  if  they  were  bayonets.  These  I  have  gradualty  cut 
away  and  transformed  into  fuel.  Many  of  my  Hemlocks  I  have  trimmed 
to  a  height  of  at  least  fifty  feet;  and  I  mean  to  serve  many  others  just  so, 
if  I  can  ever  find  time  before  old  age  compels  me  to  stop  climbing. 

But  the  Hemlock  so  bristles  throughout  with  limbs  that  it  can  easily  be 
climbed  by  a  hale  man  till  he  is  seventy;  and,  working  with  a  hatchet  01 
light  axe,  you  commence  trimming  at  the  top, —  that  is  as  high  as  you 
choose  to  trim, —  and,  without  difficulty,  cut  all  smooth  as  you  work  your 
way  down.  Limbs  to  the  ground  may  be  graceful  in  the  edge  of  your 
wood ;  but  your  tree  will  not  make  timber  nearly  so  fast  as  if  trimmed, 
and  you  cannot  afford  it  so  much  space  as  it  claims  in  the  heart  of  youi 
patch  of  forest. 

If  I  linger  proudly  among  my  trees,  consider  that  here  most  of  my  farm- 
work  has  been  done,  and  here  my  profit  has  been  realized,  in  the  shape  of 
health  and  vigour.  When  I  am  asked  the  usual  question,  "  How  has  your 
farming  paid  ?  "  I  can  truthfully  answer  that  my  part  of  it  has  paid  splen- 
didly, being  all  income  and  no  outgo, —  and  who  can  show  a  better  balance- 
sheet  than  that  f* 

Soon  after  buying  his  farm,  Mr.  Greeley  built  him  a  home 
in  the  woods.  He  says  of  it  in  the-  work  from  which  the  fore- 
going extracts  have  been  made: 

4  Ibid.  303-4. 


378 


LrFE   OF   IIORACK   GKEKLKY. 


In  the  little  dell  or  glen  through  which  11x3'  brook  emerges  from  the 
wood  -wherein  it  has  brawled  down  the  hill,  to  dunce  across  a  gentle  slope 
to  the  swamp  below,  is  the  spring, —  pure  as  crystal,  never-failing,  cold  aa 
you  could  wish  it  for  drink  in  the  hottest  day,  and  so  thoroughly  shaded 
and  sheltered  that,  I  am  confident,  it  was  never  warm  and  never  frozen 
over.  Many  springs  on  my  farm  are  excellent,  but  this  is  peerless.  It 
determined  the  location  of  my  house,  which  stands  on  a  little  plateau  or 
bench  of  level  ground  halfway  down  the  hill,  some  twenty  rods  north  of, 
and  forty  feet  higher  than,  itself.  I  never  saw  a  sweeter  spot  than  was 


THE   HOrSE  IN   TIIE   WOODS. 

the  little  plat  of  grass  which  my  house  has  supplanted,  with  tall  woods  all 
around,  and  a  thrifty  growth  of  young  hemlocks  starting  thickly  just  west 
and  south  of  it.  I  do  not  now  regard  this  as  a  judicious  location:  it  is 
too  much  shaded  and  shut  in;  it  is  too  damp  for  health  in  a  wet  time;  it 
tempts  the  chimney  to  smoke,  especially  when  the  atmosphere  is  so  heavy 
that  the  wind  beats  down  over  the  wooded  hill  that  rises  directly  on  the 


FARM  WOKK.  37& 

north  and  east;  but  the  hottest  day  is  cool  here;  dust  Is  unknown;  and 
no  rumble  from  any  highway  disturbs  meditation  or  piques  curiosity.  My 
house  is  not  much,  —  hastily  erected,  small,  slight,  and  wooden,  it  has  at 
length  been  almost  deserted  for  one  recently  purchased  and  refitted  on 
the  edge  of  the  village,  just  where  my  private  road  emerges  from  the  farm, 
on  its  way  to  the  station ;  but  the  cottage  in  the  woods  it  still  my  house, 
where  my  books  remain,  where  I  mean  to  garner  my  treasures,  and  wherein 
I  propose  to  be  "at  home  "  to  my  friends  at  stated  seasons,  and  "not  at 
home  "  to  any  one  when  I  address  myself  to  work,  and  especially  to  the 
consummation  of  a  yet  unaired  literary  project.  But  these  are  dreams, 
which  opportunity  may  never  be  afforded  to  realize.  As  yet,  I  am  a  horse 
in  a  bark-mill,  and  tread  his  monotonous  round ;  never  finding  time  to  do 
to-day  what  can  possibly  be  postponed  to  the  morrow. 

The  intelligent  reader  may  judge  from  the  illustration  that 
the  '*  house  in  the  woods  "  was  not  only  "  too  damp  for  health 
in  a  wet  time,"  but  at  any  time.  The  bane,  as  well  as  the 
ugliness,  of  too  many  American  homes  is  the  want  of  lawn. 
One  may  see  many  a  "  front-yard  "  of  beautiful  residence  so 
over-adorned  with  evergreens,  mountain-ash  trees,  shrubbery, 
that  one  can  hardly  see  the  house,  but  can  plainly  perceive 
from  the  thriftless,  yellow  grass,  and  the  very  odour  of  the 
dank  atmosphere,  that  here  is  an  utter  ignorance  of  the  might 
and  beauty  and  beneficence  of  sunshine.  Eternal  shade  is 
eternal  gloom  and  an  infallible  recipe  against  good  health  and 
bright  spirits. 

We  have  already  seen  how  in  some  respects  Mr.  Greeley 
improved  his  farm.  Originally  of  poor  soil  in  portions,  and 
a  swamp  where  the  soil  was  rich,  he  made  the  whole  produc- 
tive, and  became  highly  successful  in  raising  wheat,  Indian 
corn,  other  grains,  and  roots  with  the  exception  of  potatoes. 
He  was  very  fortunate  with  turnips  and  Indian  corn  —  a  fact 
manifested  by  several  premiums  at  agricultural  fairs. 

But  perhaps  the  most  notable  success  of  Mr.  Greeley  as  a 
farmer  was  in  making  his  marshy  land  ("  My  Swamp,"  as  he 
calls  it)  cultivable  and  very  productive.  He  gives  a  full 
account  of  his  labours  in  this  part  of  his  farm-life,  in  a  chap- 
ter in  "  What  I  Know  of  Farming,"  introductory  to  the  general 
subject  of  draining. 6 

•  Page  62  el  seq. 


380  LIFE   OF  HOKACK   GKEELET. 

My  farm  is  in  the  township  of  Newcastle,  Westchester  County,  N.  Y., 
35  miles  from  our  City  Hall,  and  a  little  eastward  of  the  hamlet  known  as 
Chappuqua,  called  into  existence  by  a  station  on  the  Harlem  Railroad.  It 
embraces  the  south-easterly  half  of  the  marsh  which  the  railroad  here 
traverses  from  south  to  north — my  part  measuring  some  fifteen  acres,  with 
five  acres  more  of  slightly  elevated  dry  land  between  it  and  the  foot  of  the 
rather  rugged  hill  whicli  rises  thence  on  the  east  and  on  the  south,  and  of 
which  I  now  own  some  fifty  acres,  lying  wholly  eastward  of  my  low  land, 
and  in  good  part  covered  with  forest.  Of  this,  I  bought  more  than  half 
in  1853,  and  the  residue  in  bits  from  time  to  time  as  I  could  afford  it.  The 
average  cost  was  between  $130  and  $140  per  acre:  one  small  and  poor  old 
cottage  being  the  only  building  I  found  on  the  tract,  which  consisted  of 
the  ragged  edges  of  two  adjacent  farms,  between  the  western  portions  of 
which  mine  is  now  interposed,  while  they  still  adjoin  each  other  beyond 
the  north  and  south  road,  half  a  mile  from  the  railroad,  on  which  their 
buildings  are  located  and  which  forms  my  eastern  boundary.  My  stony, 
gravelly  upland  mainly  slopes  to  the  west;  but  two  acres  on  my  east  line 
incline  toward  the  road  which  bounds  me  in  that  direction,  while  two 
more  on  my  south  east  corner  descend  to  the  little  brook  which,  entering 
at  that  corner,  keeps  irregularly  near  my  south  line,  until  it  emerges, 
swelled  by  a  smaller  runnel  that  enters  my  lowland  from  the  north  and 
traverses  it  to  meet  and  pass  off  with  the  larger  brooklet  aforesaid.  I  have 
done  some  draining,  to  no  great  purpose,  on  the  more  level  portions  of  my 
upland ;  but  my  lowland  has  challenged  my  best  efforts  in  this  line,  and  I 
shall  here  explain  them,  for  the  encouragement  and  possible  guidance  of 
novices  in  draining.  Let  me  speak  first  of 

MY  DIFFICULTIES. — This  marsh  or  bog  consisted,  when  I  first  grappled 
with  it,  of  some  thirty  acres,  whereof  I  then  owned  less  than  a  third.  To 
drain  it  to  advantage,  one  person  should  own  it  all,  or  the  different  owners 
should  coo'perate ;  but  I  had  to  go  it  alone,  with  no  other  aid  than  a  freely 
accorded  privilege  of  straightening  as  well  as  deepening  the  brook  which 
wound  its  way  through  the  dryer  meadow  just  below  me,  forming  here  the 
boundary  of  two  adjacent  farms.  I  spent  $100  on  this  job,  which  is  still 
imperfect;  but  the  first  decided  fall  in  the  stream  occurs  nearly  a  mile 
below  me;  and  you  tire  easily  of  doing  at  your  own  cost  work  which  ben- 
efits several  others  as  much  as  yourself.  My  drainage  will  never  l>e  perfect 
till  this  brook,  with  that  far  larger  one  in  which  it  is  merged  sixty  rods 
below  me,  shall  have  been  sunk  three  or  four  feet,  at  a  further  expense  of 
at  least  $oOO. 

This  bog  or  swamp,  when  I  first  bought  into  it,  was  mainly  dedicated  to 
the  use  of  frogs,  muskrats,  and  snapping-turtles.  A  few  small  water-elms 
and  soft  maples  grew  upon  it,  with  swamp  alder  partly  fringing  the  west 
ern  base  of  the  hill  east  of  it,  where  the  rocks  which  had,  through  thousands 
of  years,  rolled  from  the  hill,  thickly  covered  the  surface,  with  springs 
bubbling  up  and  around  among  them.  Decaying  stumps  and  imbedded 
fragments  of  trees  argued  that  timber  formerly  covered  this  marsh  as  well 
as  the  encircling  hills.  A  tall,  dense  growth  of  blackberry  briers,  thor- 


DRAINING.  381 

oughwort,  and  all  manner  of  marsh-weeds  and  grasses  covered  the  centre 
of  the  swamp  each  Summer;  but  my  original  portion  of  it,  being  too  wet 
for  these,  was  mainly  addicted  to  hassocks  or  tussocks  of  wiry,  worthless 
grass ;  their  matted  roots  rising  in  hard  bunches  a  few  inches  above  the 
soft,  bare,  encircling  mud.  The  bog  ranged  in  depth  from  a  few  inches  to 
five  or  six  feet,  and  was  composed  of  black,  peaty,  vegetable  mold,  diver- 
sified by  occasional  streaks  of  clay  or  sand,  all  resting  on  a  substratum  of 
hard,  coarse  gravel,  out  of  which  two  or  three  springs  bubbled  up,  in 
addition  to  the  half  a  dozen  which  poured  in  from  the  east,  and  a  tiny 
rivulet  which  (except  in  a  very  dry,  hot  time)  added  the  tribute  of  three  or 
four  more,  which  sprang  from  the  base  of  a  higher  shelf  of  the  hill  near 
the  middle  of  what  is  now  my  farm.  Add  to  these  that  the  brook  which 
brawled  and  foamed  down  my  hill-side  near  my  south  line  as  aforesaid, 
had  brought  along  an  immensity  of  pebbles  and  gravel  of  which  it  had 
mainly  formed  my  five  acres  of  dryer  lowland,  had  thus  built  up  a  pretty 
swale,  whereon  it  had  the  bad  habit  of  filling  up  one  channel,  and  then 
cutting  another,  more  devious  and  eccentric,  if  possible,  than  any  of  its 
predecessors  —  and  you  have  some  idea  of  the  obstacles  I  encountered  and 
resolved  to  overcome.  One  of  my  first  substantial  improvements  was  the 
cutting  of  a  straight  channel  for  this  current  and,  by  walling  it  with  large 
stones,  compelling  the  brook  to  respect  necessary  limitations.  It  was  not 
my  fault  that  some  of  those  stones  were  set  nearly  upright,  so  as  to  veneer 
the  brook  rather  than  thoroughly  constrain  it;  hence,  some  of  the  stones, 
undermined  by  strong  currents,  were  pitched  forward  into  the  brook  by 
high  Spring  freshets,  so  as  to  require  resetting  more  carefully.  This  was 
a  mistake,  but  not  one  of 

MY  BLUNDERS.  —  These,  the  natural  results  of  inexperience  and  haste, 
were  very  grave.  Not  only  had  I  had  no  real  experience  in  draining  when 
I  began,  but  I  could  hire  no  foreman  who  knew  much  more  of  it  than  I 
did.  I  ought  to  have  begun  by  securing  an  ample  and  sure  fall  where  the 
water  left  my  land,  and  next  cut  down  the  brooklet  or  open  ditch  into 
which  I  intended  to  drain  to  the  lowest  practicacle  point — so  low,  at  least, 
that  no  drain  running  into  it  should  ever  be  troubled  with  back-water. 
Nothing  can  be  more  useless  than  a  drain  in  which  water  stagnates,  chok- 
ing it  with  mud.  Then  I  should  have  bought  hundreds  of  Hemlock  or 
other  cheap  boards,  slit  them  to  a  width  of  four  or  five  inches,  and,  having 
opened  the  needed  drains,  laid  these  in  the  bottom  and  the  tile  thereupon, 
taking  care  to  break-joint,  by  covering  the  meeting  ends  of  two  boards  with 
the  middle  of  a  tile.  Laying  tile  in  the  soft  mud  of  a  bog,  with  nothing 
beneath  to  prevent  their  sinking,  is  simply  throwing  away  labour  and 
money.  I  cannot  wonder  that  tile-draining  seems  to  many  a  humbug, 
seeing  that  so  many  tile  are  laid  so  that  they  can  never  do  any  good. 

Having,  by  successive  purchases,  become  owner  of  fully  half  this 
swamp,  and  by  repeated  blunders  discovered  that  making  stone  drains  in 
a  bog,  while  it  is  a  capital  mode  of  getting  rid  of  the  stone,  is  no  way  at 
all  to  dry  the  soil,  I  closed  my  series  of  experiments  two  years  since  by 
carefully  relaying  my  generally  useless  tile  on  good  strips  of  board,  sink- 


382  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

Jng  them  just  as  deep  as  I  could  persuade  the  water  to  run  off  freely,  and, 
instead  of  allowing  them  to  discharge  into  a  brooklet  or  open  ditch,  con- 
necting each  with  a  covered  main  of  four  to  six-inch  tile;  these  mains 
discharging  into  the  running  brook  which  drains  all  my  farm  and  three  or 
four  of  those  above  it  just  where  it  runs  swiftly  off  from  my  land.  If  a 
thaw  or  heavy  rain  swells  the  brook  (as  it  sometimes  will)  so  that  it  rises 
above  my  outlet  aforesaid,  the  strong  current  formed  by  the  concentration 
of  the  clear  contents  of  so  many  drains  will  not  allow  the  muddy  water 
of  the  brook  to  back  into  it  so  many  as  three  feet  at  most;  and  any  mud 
or  sediment  that  may  be  deposited  there  will  be  swept  out  clean  whenever 
the  brook  shall  have  fallen  to  the  drainage  level. 

MY  SUCCESS. — I  judge  that  there  are  not  many  tracts  more  difficult  to 
drain  than  mine  was,  considering  all  the  circumstances,  except  those 
which  are  frequently  flowed  by  tides  or  the  waters  of  some  lake  or  river. 
Had  I  owned  the  entire  swamp,  or  had  there  been  a  fall  in  the  brook  just 
below  me,  had  I  had  any  prior  experience  in  draining,  or  had  others 
equally  interested  cooperated  in  the  good  work,  my  task  would  have  been 
comparatively  light.  As  it  was,  I  made  mistakes  which  increased  the  cost 
and  postponed  the  success  of  my  efforts ;  but  this  is  at  length  complete. 
I  had  seven  acres  of  Indian  Corn,  one  of  Corn  Fodder,  two  of  Oats,  and 
seven  or  eight  .acres  of  Grass,  on  my  lowland  in  1869 ;  and,  though  the 
Spring  months  were  quite  rainy,  and  the  latter  part  of  Summer  rather  dry, 
my  crops  were  all  good.  I  did  not  see  better  in  Westchester  County;  and 
I  shall  be  quite  content  with  as  good  hereafter.  Of  my  seven  hundred 
bushels  of  Corn  (ears),  I  judge  that  two-thirds  would  be  accounted  fit  for 
seed  anywhere ;  my  Grass  was  cut  twice,  and  yielded  one  large  crop  and 
another  heavier  than  the  average  first  crop  throughout  our  State.  My 
drainage  will  require  some  care  henceforth ;  but  the  fifteen  acres  I  have 
reclaimed  from  utter  uselessncss  and  obstructions  are  decidedly  the  best 
part  of  my  farm.  Uplands  may  be  exhausted ;  these  never  can  be. 

The  experience  of  another  season  (1870)  of  protracted  drouth  has  fully 
justified  my  most  sanguine  expectations.  I  had  this  year  four  acres  of 
Corn,  and  as  many  of  Oats,  on  my  swamp,  with  the  residue  in  Grass ;  and 
they  were  all  good.  I  estimate  my  first  Hay  crop  at  over  two  and  a  half 
tuns  per  acre,  while  the  rowen  or  aftermath  barely  exceeded  half  a  tuu 
per  acre,  because  of  the  severity  of  the  drouth,  which  began  in  July  and 
lasted  till  October.  My  Oats  were  good,  but  not  remarkably  so ;  and  I 
had  810  bushels  of  ears  of  sound,  ripe  Corn  from  four  acres  of  drained 
swamp  and  two  and  a  half  of  upland.  I  estimate  my  upland  Corn  at 
seventy  (shelled)  bushels,  and  my  lowland  at  fifty-five  (shelled)  bushels  per 
acre.  Others,  doubtless,  had  more,  despite  the  unpropitious  season ;  but 
ray  crop  was  a  fair  one,  and  I  am  content  with  it.  My  upland  Corn  was 
heavily  manured :  my  lowland  but  moderately.  There  are  many  to  tell 
you  how  much  I  lose  by  my  farming.  I  only  say  that,  as  yet,  no  one  else 
Ins  lost  a  farthing  by  it,  and  I  do  not  complain. 

In  a  loss  extensive  way,  Mr.  Greelej  also  had  noteworthy 


IRRIGATING.  383 

success  in  irrigation;  and  also  failure,  of  wliicli  he  gives  char- 
acteristic account: 

When  I  first  bought  land  I  fully  purposed  to  provide  for  irrigating  my 
nearly  level  acres  at  will,  and  I  constructed  two  dams  across  my  upland 
stream  with  that  view;  but  they  were  so  badly  planned  that  they  went  off 
in  the  flood  caused  by  a  tremendous  rain  the  next  Spring;  and,  though  I 
rebuilt  one  of  them,  I  submitted  to  a  miscalculation  which  provided  for 
taking  the  water,  by  means  of  a  syphon,  out  of  the  pond  at  the  top  and 
over  the  bank  that  rose  fifteen  or  twenty  feet  above  the  surface  of  the 
water.  Of  course,  air  would  work  into  the  pipe  after  it  had  carried  a 
stream  unexceptionably  for  two  or  three  days,  and  then  the  water  would 
run  no  longer.  Had  I  taken  it  from  the  bottom  of  the  pond  through  my 
dam,  it  would  have  run  forever  (or  so  long  as  there  was  water  covering  ita 
inlet  in  the  pond);  but  bad  engineering  flung  me;  and  I  have  never  since 
had  the  heart  (or  the  means)  to  revise  and  correct  its  errors. 

My  next  attempt  was  on  a  much  humbler  scale,  and  I  engineered  it 
myself.  Toward  the  north  end  of  niy  farm,  the  hill-side  which  rises  east 
of  my  lowland  is  broken  by  a  swale  or  terrace,  which  gives  me  three  or 
four  acres  of  tolerably  level  upland,  along  the  upper  edge  of  which  five 
or  six  springs,  which  never  wholly  fail,  burst  from  the  rocks  above  and 
unite  to  form  a  petty  runnel,  which  dries  up  in  very  hot  or  diy  weather, 
but  which  usually  preserved  a  tiny  stream  to  be  lost  in  the  swamp  below. 
North  of  the  gully  cut  down  the  lower  hill-side  by  thic  streamlet,  the  hill- 
side of  some  three  acres  is  quite  steep,  still  partially  wooded,  and  wholly 
devoted  to  pasturage.  Making  a  petty  dam  across  this  runnel  at  the  top 
of  the  lower  acclivity,  I  turned  the  stream  aside,  so  that  it  should  hence- 
forth run  along  the  crest  of  ifcis  lower  hill,  falling  off  gradually  so  as  to 
secure  a  free  current,  and  Ios;n4  ?.t?  contents  at  intervals  through  variable 
depressions  in  its  lower  bask.  Iftai  and  artificial  water-course  together 
cost  me  $90,  which  was  about  Iwvje  •y/h&i  it  should  have  been.  That  rude 
and  petty  contrivance  has  new  been  tea  years  in  operation,  and  may  have 
cost  $5  per  annum  for  oversight  «?ni  repairs.  Its  effect  has  been  to  double 
the  grass  grown  on  the  two  sxves  it  oer^Jitly  irrigates,  for  which  I  paid 
$280,  or  more  than  thrice  the  cos*';  of  my  irrigation.  But  more:  my  hill- 
Bide,  while  it  was  well  grassed  in  Spviug,  always  gave  out  directly  after 
the  first  dry,  or  hot  week;  so  th4t,  when  I  most  needed  feed,  it  afforded 
none;  its  herbage  being  parched  up  and  dead,  and  thus  remaining  till 
refreshed  by  generous  rains.  I  judge,  therefore,  that  my  irrigation  has 
more  than  doubled  the  product  of  the&e  two  acres,  and  that  these  are 
likely  to  lose  nothing  in  yield  or  value  so  long  as  that  petty  irrigating 
ditch  shall  be  maintained. 

I  know  this  is  small  business.  Bat  suppose  each  of  the  hundred  thou- 
sand New-England  farms,  whereof  five  to  ten  acres  might  be  thus  irrigated 
at  a  cost  not  exceeding  f  100  per  farm,  had  been  similarly  prepared  to  flow 
those  acres  last  Spring  and  early  Summer,  with  an  average  increase  there- 
from of  barely  one  tun  of  Hay  (or  its  equivalent  in  pasturage)  per  acre. 


384  LIFE  OF  HORACE   QKEELET. 

The  500,000  tuns  of  Hay  thus  realized  would  have  saved  200,000  head  of 
cattle  from  being  sent  to  the  butcher  while  too  thin  for  good  beef,  while 
every  one  of  them  was  required  for  further  use,  and  will  have  to  be  re- 
placed at  a  heavy  cost.  Shall  not  these  things  be  considered  ?  Shall  not 
.11  who  can  do  so  at  moderate  cost  resolve  to  test  on  their  own  farms  the 
advantages  and  benefits  that  may  be  secured  by  Irrigation  ? ' 

When  Mr.  Greeley  removed  to  his  later  farmhouse, — which 
continued  to  be  his  home  during  the  remainder  of  his  life, — • 
the  Chappaqua  property  had  been  vastly  improved,  and  very 
much  of  the  work  had  been  done  u  ruler  his  direct  supervision, 
not  a  little,  especially  in  the  woods  awl  orchard,  by  his  own 
hands.  The  residence  itself  was  a  large,  plain  mansion,  with 
wide  piazzas  extending  along  the  entire  front  of  the  building. 
It  is  an  exceedingly  comfortable  home,  and,  with  few  trees  to 
^hut  out  the  sun,  has  an  air  of  cheerfulness  unknown  to  the 
House  in  the  woods. 

Mr.  Greeley's  orchard  became  quite  famous  in  the  country, 
and  in  1870 — a  great  fruit  year — he  produced  more  cider 
apples  than  he  could  sell  to  the  vinegar-makers  at  fifty  cents  a 
barrel.  He  built  a  fine  barn  on  his  farm,  wholly  of  stones 
gathered  or  blasted  from  the  slope  near  the  summit  of  which 
it  stands.  He  built  it  in  such  manner  that  the  walls  are  nearly 
solid  rock,  the  roof  being  of  Vermont  slate.  "  I  drive,"  he 
says,  "  into  three  stories, — a  basstneat  for  manures,  a  stable  for 
animals,  and  a  story  above  this  for  hay, — while  grain  is  pitched 
into  the  loft  or  'scaffold'  above,  from  whose  floor  the  roof 
rises  steep  to  a  height  of  fiixtse^  to  eighteen  feet.  There 
should  have  been  more  windows  for  light  and  air;  but  my 
oarn  is  convenient,  while  impervious  to  frost,  and  I  am  con- 
fident that  cattle  are  wintered  in  it  at  a  fourth  less  cost  than 
when  they  shiver  in  board  shanties,  with  cracks  between  the 
boards  that  will  admit  your  hand." 

Thus  the  general  facts  in  respect  of  Mr.  Greeley's  farmer- 
Mfe  were:  He  found  healthful  exercise  for  both  body  and 
mind  in  the  labour  which  he  there  performed.  He  succeeded 
admirably  in  making  a  considerable  tract  of  what  in  many 
portions  of  the  country  would  be  thought  "  waste  land  "  not 

•  Ibid.  pp.  7G-7-8. 


"WHAT  i  KNOW  OF  FARMING.  '  385 

only  cultivable  "but  a  highly  valuable  portion  of  his  farm.  Ho 
raised  good  crops.  Year  after  year,  his  practical  success 
herein  was  as  good  as  that  of  his  neighbours.  He  made  an 
exceptionally  good  orchard,  waging  constant  and  exterminat- 
ing warfare  against  the  caterpillars.  "  I  lay  down  the  general 
proposition,"  he  once  said,  "  that  no  man  who  harbours  cater- 
pillars has  any  moral  right  to  apples — that  each  grower  should 
be  required  to  make  his  choice  between  them."  He  had  tine 
success  in  drainage,  and  practically  established  the  value  of 
irrigation  on  a  small  scale.  He  made  it  clear  that  he  could 
make  farming  reasonably  and  steadily  profitable. 

We  shall  have  occasion  hereafter  to  speak  at  some  length  of 
Mr.  Greeley  as  the  author  of  books,  and  there  to  make  special 
mention  of  the  volume  entitled  "  What  I  Know  of  Farming." 
It  will  suffice  here  to  say  that  the  essays  which  compose  the 
work  were  originally  contributed,  in  weekly  installments  to  a 
public  journal,  under  the  heading  which  forms  the  title  of  the 
volume.  About  this  time  a  vast  deal  of  game  was  made  of 
Mr.  Greeley  by  the  wits  and  wags  of  the  press  in  all  parts  of 
the  country.  Scarcely  a  journal  appeared  that  did  not  have 
some  jest  at  his  expense.  One,  I  recollect,  gravely  asserted 
that  Horace  Greeley  preferred  the  hydraulic  ram  to  the  Merino. 
Another  asserted  that  for  the  cultivation  of  sardines  he  pre- 
ferred uplands  to  lowlands.  Still  another  asseverated  that  he 
undoubtedly  produced  the  best  turnips  in  the  United  States, 
and  at  the  trifling  cost  of  two  dollars  and.  eighty-seven  cents 
apiece.  There  was  scarcely  an  absurdity,  indeed,  but  he  was 
charged  withal,  and  it  may  well  be  doubted  whether  any  other 
topic  ever  served  for  so  many  newspaperial  jests  as  Mr.  Gree- 
ley's  "What  I  Know  of  Farming."  Singularly  enough,  not  a 
few  persons  received  these  jokes  as  solemn  fact's;  and  it  may 
safely  be  affirmed  that  there  are  to  this  day  thousands  of 
American  citizens  who  think  that  Mr.  Greeley,  instead  of  the 
reasonably  successful  farmer  he  was,  was  in  that  regard  only  fit 
to  be  laughed  at. 

The  effect  of  these  constant  jests  upon  Mr.  Greeley  was 
sometimes  extremely  laughable.  The  good  wit  or  the  passable 
waggery  were  amusing  to  him;  but  when  he  received  letters 
25 


386 


LIFE   OF  HORACE   GREELEY. 


propounding  preposterous  inquiries,  as  he  sometimes  did,  lie 
manifested  less  amiability.  In  truth,  as  we  shall  presently  see, 
the  essays  which  were  made  the  cause  of  so  much  mirth  and  so 
much  unintended  misrepresentation,  came  to  form  a  volume 
of  exceeding  practical  value  to  farmers,  and  a  notable  illustra- 
tion of  Mr.  Greeley's  hearty  devotion  to  the  elevation  of 
Labour  and  the  welfare  of  the  people. 


%^p^^'':'/'-'^- . 
^^%^^^^s^'-^ 

MURAT   HALSTEAD.-See  page  t»3. 


CHAPTER   XXII. 

THE  WAR  OF  TIIE  REBELLION  BEGUN. 

The  Election  of  Abraham  Lincoln  Made  a  Pretext  for  War — Mr.  Grecloy'a 
Opinion  upon  the  Right  of  Secession  — He  Demands  a  Vote  of  the  South- 
crn  People,  Expressing  a  Willingness  to  Abide  by  the  Result  —  A  Reply 
to  Mr.  Thurlow  Weed's  Assertion  that  Mr.  Grceleywas  a  Secessionist  — 
A  Candidate  for  United  State  Senator  —  The  Tribune  During  the  Early 
Part  of  the  War— "On  To  Richmond!"— Mr.  Fitz  Henry  Warren's 
Washington  Letters  —  The  Washington  Extemporaneous  Club  of  Critics 

—  The  Defeat  of  Bull  Run  — Its  Cause  — Mr.  Grecley  "Stampeded"  — 
Messrs.  Dana  and  Warren  Retire  from  The  Tribune  —  Secretary  Stanton 

—  His  Letter  to  Mr.  Grcclcy  —  Organizes  Victory  for  the  Union  Arms 

—  The  Policy  of  The  Tribune. 

Seen,  as  has  been  described,  was  the  home  life  of  Horace 
Greeley,  such,  as  has  been  related,  were  his  labours  on  the 
Chappaqua  farm.  But  it  is  not  to  be  supposed  that  his  ser- 
vices in  behalf  of  the  country  were  any  less  constant,  or  his 
work  any  less  severe,  after  he  came  in  possession  of  his  farm 
than  before.  Though  his  life  was  ever  a  busy  one,  he  probably 
performed  more  and  more  various  labours  during  the  last 
twelve  years  of  it  than  ever  before  fell  to  the  lot  of  one  man. 

The  election  of  Abraham  Lincoln  in  November,  1860,  was 
made  a  pretext  for  civil  war.  The  political  leaders  of  the 
South  had  quite  generally  adopted  two  erroneous  doctrines  by 
which  they  were  easily  led  to  sanction  a  war  against  the  Union. 
One  of  these  erroneous  doctrines  was  that  which  made  the 
State  paramount  to  the  Republic  not  only  as  respects  the 
domestic  affairs  of  the  commonwealth,  but  in  all  respects.  The 
other  was  a  belief  in  the  political  propriety  and  in  the  moral- 
ity of  human  slavery.  These  doctrines  made  secession  from 
the  Union  an  easy  matter  with  those  who  believed  in  them. 
They  readily  found  in  the  election  of  an  anti-slavery  President 
a  pretext  for  war. 

It  is  to  be  observed  that  the  people  of  the  whole  republic 

(387) 


388  LIFE   CMf  HORACE  OKEELET. 

were  in  one  sense  responsible  for  the  terrible  civil  war  of 
1861-65.  Slavery  was  not  the  cause  of  more  unhappiness  to 
the  blacks  than  of  utter  demoralization  to  the  whites.  Nor 
were  its  effects  worse  in  the  often  manifested  barbarism  of 
Southern  politicians  than  in  the  cringing  cowardice  of  many 
politicians  of  the  North,  these  being  held  as  representative  of 
Northern  sentiment  generally.  And  not  without  much  show 
of  reason.  A  half  century  before  the  war,  the  nation,  largely 
through  the  influence  of  Henry  Clay,  had  declined  to  settle  the 
question  of  slavery  extension,  but  had  "  compromised  "  instead. 
Some  twelve  years  afterwards,  again  largely  throusrh  the  same 
influence,  the  republic  had  failed  to  settle  the  question  of  nul- 
lification, preferring  to  creep  its  way  out  of  the  difficulty 
through  a  "  compromise."  And  less  than  twenty  years  after 
this,  still  again  largely  through  the  same  influence,  even  a  more 
humiliating  "compromise"  than  either  of  the  others  was 
effected.  We  were,  therefore,  a  nation  of  slaveholders  and 
apologists  of  slavery.  When  the  history  of  the  times  and 
measures  to  which  I  here  refer  shall  be  written,  with  truth  and 
fulness,  it  will  be  seen  that  the  influence  of  Henry  Clay  was 
more  unfortunate  than  that  of  Mr.  Calhoun,  whilst  his  genius 
was  far  less  lofty  and  admirable.  The  compromises  which  gave 
Henry  Clay  the  sobriquet  of  "  The  Great  Pacificator  "  were  of 
incalculable  detriment  to  the  republic,  and  one  of  the  most 
potential  causes  of  our  costly  and  bloody  civil  war.  They 
made  half  the  nation  devoted  to  iniquity,  the  other  half  to 
iniquity  and  trifling. 

Hence  it  was  no  difficult  matter  for  the  adherents  of  slavery 
to  make  the  election  of  an  anti-slavery  President  a  plausible 
pretext  for  insurrection.  They  claimed  that  such  an  election 
was  an  abridgement  of  their  rights,  or  would  necessarily  so 
result.  And  they  asserted  that,  failing  to  secure  their  rights 
within  the  Union,  it  was  their  duty  to  secede  from  it.  They 
had  plausible  arguments  in  favour  both  of  slavery  and  of  seces- 
sion in  the  political  history  of  the  country;  whilst  in  behalf 
of  secession  they  made  powerful  appeals  to  the  people  with  the 
argument  of  natural  rights,  —  the  same  upon  which  our  revo- 
•ution  had  been  based  and  independence  achicTed.  There  was 


ABRAHAM  LINCOLN. 


SECESSION.  380 

in  all  this  subtle  sophistry,  most  preposterous  assumption  of 
premises;  but  the  conduct  of  the  nation  upon  the  subject  of 
slavery  had  been  such  that  the  reasonings  of  secessionists  had 
great  apparent  force.  If  they  made  the  worse  appear  the 
better  reason  we  of  the  North  had  given  them  the  best  argu- 
ments they  were  able  to  use  on  one  branch  of  the  subject.  By 
our  cowardly  compromises  we  had  actually  placed  slavery 
among  our  great  and  glorious  "  free  institutions." 

The  election  of  Abraham  Lincoln  was  a  demonstration  that 
the  North  did  not  sanction  slavery.  Up  to  that  time  the  North 
had  been  grossly  deceived  on  this  subject.  The  people  had  all 
the  time  been  betrayed  by  the  politicians;  and,  chiefly  on  ac- 
count of  the  powerful  despotism  of  party,  had  been  unable  to 
make  their  true  sentiments  known.  "Uncle  Tom's  Cabin" 
was  scarcely  more  of  an  argument  against  slavery  than  it  wag 
an  embodiment  of  preponderating  Northern  sentiment.  The 
terrible  mistake  of  the  South  was  in  supposing  that  the.  politi- 
cians, instead  of  Mrs.  Stowe  and  the  abolitionists,  were 
representative  of  the  North. 

Nevertheless,  neither  Mr.  Lincoln  nor  the  Republican  party 
thought  of  any  unlawful  or  even  extreme  measure  against  sla- 
very. It  was  proposed  by  him  and  his  adherents  that  it  should 
be  no  further  extended.  This  was  all.  There  was  no  thought 
of  interference  by  the  national  government  in  the  policy  of  the 
Republicans.  They  were  anti-slavery,  but  they  were  not 
destructives,. 

In  the  election  of  Mr.  Lincoln,  therefore,  the  South  had  no 
cause  but  only  a  pretext  for  secession  and  resulting  war.  lie 
and  his  party  were  blameless;  secession  wholly  at  fault.  The 
former,  when  war  came,  were  altogether  in  the  right;  the  latter 
was  wholly  in  the  wrong.  The  fearful  responsibility  of  the 
terrible  contest  must,  therefore,  be  placed  with  the  seces- 
sionists. 

And,  though  they  were  not  sustained  at  first  by  the  general 
public  of.  the  South,  it  must  be  confessed  they  conducted  their 
cause  with  consummate  skill,  and  gave  it  great  apparent 
strength  even  from  the  beginning.  It  is  not  improbable  they 
would  have  given  it  irresistible  power,  —  or  power  which  could 


390  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

not  have  been  resisted  by  the  administration  of  President 
Lincoln,  —  but  for  the  course  pursued  by  Horace  Greeley . 

Mr.  Thurlow  Weed,  in  his  "  Recollections  of  'Horace  Gree- 
ley," says, l  "  We  both  supported  Mr.  Lincoln  warmly,  but 
after  his  election  and  during  the  war  collisions  and  antagon- 
isms placed  a  great  gulf  between  us.  He  was  radical,  and  I 
was  conservative.  He  was  in  favour  of  secession  and  I  against 
it.  He  was  in  favour  of  peace,  while  I  urged  a  vigorous 
prosecution  of  the  war."  The  statements  of  active  politicians 
may  always  be  carefully  examined  before  unbounded  trust  can 
be  safely  placed  in  them.  Mr.  Weed  is  perfectly  correct  in 
saying  that  a  great  gulf  had  been  placed  between  him  and  Mr. 
Greeley.  The  "collisions  and  antagonisms"  which  formed 
the  gulf  were  not  created,  however,  after  Mr.  Lincoln's  election 
and  during  the  war.  Mr.  Greeley's  famous  letter  dissolving 
the  firm  of  "Seward,  Weed,  and  Greeley"  —  written  Novem- 
ber 11,  1854  —  was  much  of  a  "  collision,"  and  the  "  antag- 
onism "  of  the  last  two  of  the  old  firm  at  the  Chicago 
Convention  of  1860  forms  a  notable  event  in  our  political 
history.  Mr.  Weed,  in  placing  his  "gulf,"  perpetrates  a 
lamentable  anachronism. 

He  proceeds  to  say  that  Mr.  Greeley  was  in  favour  of  seces- 
sion, while  he  (Mr.  Weed)  opposed  it.  This  testimony  may  be 
regarded  as  ample  upon  Mr.  Weed's  position  upon  this  ques- 
tion, but  is  far  from  conclusive  as  to  Mr.  Greeley's  sentiments. 
We  may  generously  allow  Mr.  Weed  to  speak  for  himself  upon 
this  and  other  topics;  and  justly  demand  a  like  privilege  for 
Mr.  Greeley. 

It  is  exceedingly  painful  for  me  to  come  into  point- 
blank  contradiction  with  a  gentleman  so  eminent  as  Mr. 
Thurlow  Weed ;  but  it  is  not  true  that  Mr.  Greeley  was  in 
favour  of  secession.  On  the  contrary,  he  was  wholly  opposed 
to  it,  and  believed  the  people  of  the  South  were  opposed  to  it. 
So  strongly  was  he  of  the  opinion  that  the  people  of  the  South 
were  opposed  to  it,  that  he  expressed  a  willingness  to  abide  by 
their  fair  vote  upon  the  subject.  And  he  demanded  that  such 

'The  Galaxy  magazine,  March,  1873. 


REPLY  TO  THURLOW  WEED.  391 

a  vote  should  be  had,  as  due  alike  to  the  people  of  the  South 
and  of  the  North.  "We  dare  the  Fire-eaters,"  said  he,  "to 
submit  the  question  of  Secession  or  no  Secession  to  the  popular 
vote  of  their  own  people.  They  will  be  badly  beaten  in  every 
State  but  South  Carolina,  and  probably  beaten  in  her  popular 
vote  also."  This  was  in  November,  1860.  In  the  same  con- 
nexion he  said:  "If  the  People  (not  the  swashy  politicians) 
shall  ever  deliberately  vote  themselves  out  of  the  Union,  we 
shall  be  in  favour  of  letting  them  go  in  peace."  They  would, 
he  believed,  do  no  such  thing;  and  he  instanced  contests  of 
the  kind  in  Mississippi,  Georgia,  and  Texas,  wherein  Secession 
had  been  overwhelmingly  defeated  by  the  people.  So  confident 
was  he  that  the  people  of  the  South,  if  allowed  to  vote  upon 
the  subject,  "  none  being  coerced  nor  intimidated,"  would  con- 
demn disunion,  that  he  could  not  as  an  honest  man  fail  to 
express  a  willingness  to  abide  by  the  result,  whatever  it  might 
be.  And  for  this  he  is  charged  with  being  in  favour  of  seces- 
sion! It  would  be  no  less  preposterous  to  assert  that  he  was 
in  favour  of  the  verdict  against  him  in  the  Fenimore  Cooper 
libel-suit,  of  which  the  history  has  heretofore  in  this  work  been 
related. 

Mr.  Greeley,  we  thus  see,  in  direct  conflict  with  Mr.  Weed's 
assertion,  was  not  only  opposed  to  Secession,  but  firmly  be- 
lieved the  people  of  the  South  were  opposed  to  it.  But 
because  he  was  willing  to  abide  by  their  uncoerced,  unintimi- 
dated  judgment  upon  the  subject,  we  are  told  that  he  was  "  in 
favour  of  Secession."  An  asseveration  more  unjust  or  illogical 
could  not  well  be  imagined. 

Mr.  Greeley  judged  it  wise  not  to  become  un-republican  in 
his  arguments  against  traitorous  Secession.  He  did  not  deny 
at  this  exciting  epocli  in  our  history  the  Right  of  Revolution. 
He  but  related  an  account  of  his  own  history  from  the  time  of 
the  beginning  of  secession  when,  in  May,  1862,  he  said:  "We 
have  steadfastly  affirmed  and  upheld  Mr.  Jefferson's  doctrine, 
embodied  in  the  Declaration  of  American  Independence,  of 
the  Right  of  Revolution.  We  have  insisted  that  where  this 
right  is  asserted,  and  its  exercise  is  properly  attempted,  it 
ought  not  to  be  necessary  to  subject  all  concerned  to  the  woes 


393  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

and  horrors  of  civil  war.  In  other  words,  what  one  party  has 
a  right  to  do,  another  can  have  no  right  to  resist."  But  he 
did  not  confound  the  Right  of  Revolution  with  that  treasona- 
ble Secession  which  brought  on  our  civil  war.  This  he 
characterized  as  the  "  violent,  terrorist,  outrageous  proceeding 
of  Southern  Jacobins."  In  his  view,  the  claim  that  Secession 
was  an  exercise  of  the  Right  of  Revolution  was  a  monstrous 
pretense.  And  we  find  him  condemning  Secession  in  The 
Tribune,  in  June,  1862,  in  the  most  unmistakable  terms: 

We  utterly  deny,  repudiate,  and  condemn  the  pretended  Right  of  Seces- 
sion. No  such  right  is  known  to  our  Federal  Constitution,  nor,  in  fact,  to 
any  civilized  framework  of  government.  No  such  right  was  reserved,  or 
supposed  to  be  reserved,  when  the  States  ratified  or  adopted  the  Federal 
Constitution.  We  do  not  believe  that  a  mere  majority  of  a  community  may, 
in  disregard  of  all  existing  forms,  upset  an  existing  government  and  put 
one  of  their  choice  in  its  place.  We  do  not  believe  the  whole  population— 
we  will  say  of  Nantucket  or  Staten  Island — have  a  right,  moved  by  a  pros 
pect  of  unlimited  gains  by  smuggling  to  the  main  land,  to  break  off  from 
the  Union  and  annex  their  island  to  Great  Britain  or  set  up  for  themselves. 
We  do  not  believe  a  nation  is,  like  a  mob  or  mass-meeting,  to  be  dispersed 
by  a  thunder-shower  or  a  steam  fire-engine  playing  upon  it. 

The  truth  is,  Horace  Greeley's  arguments,  before  the  out 
break  of  hostilities  and  during  the  early  period  of  the  war,  in 
behalf  of  the  Right  of  Revolution,  so  far  from  showing  that 
he  was  "  in  favour  of  Secession  "  not  only  prove  the  contrary, 
as  we  have  seen,  but  are  also  a  demonstration  of  his  superior 
sagacity,  foresight,  statesmanship.  For  consider  the  situation: 
The  closing  months  of  President  Buchanan's  administration 
were  not  characterised  by  any  vigorous  policy  against  the 
threatened  insurrection.  Members  of  his  Cabinet  greatly 
assisted  the  disunion  movement;  and  he  himself  could  find  no 
authority  in  the  Constitution  empowering  him  to  save  the 
Union  by  force  of  arms.  He  could  not,  he  said,  "  coerce  a 
State."  This  was  but  one  way  of  saying  that  a  State  is  para- 
mount to  the  Nation.  It  was  a  virtual  recognition  of  Secession. 
President  Lincoln  entered  upon  his  duties,  therefore,  with  the 
hands  of  the  Executive  Department  tied.  Pacification,  through 
compromise,  was  again  attempted.  The  insurrection  was  far 
better  prepared  for  war  than  the  republic.  It  was  wise  to  do 


CANDIDATE  FOR  SENATOR.  393 

what  could  honourably  be  done  to  have  the  insurrectionists 
think  there  would  be  no  war.  Who  could  do  this  more  effect- 
ually than  Horace  Greeley,  through  that  journal  which  was 
regarded  as  most  of  all  representative  of  Northern  sentiment? 
How  could  he  possibly  perform  the  great  and  delicate  duty, 
more  wisely  than  by  upholding  the  Right  of  Revolution?  If 
we  fairly  consider  the  situation  we  shall  not  fail  to  be  convinced 
that  by  no  possibility  could  Mr.  Greeley  have  done  more  to 
enable  the  government  to  save  the  republic  than  by  giving  the 
government  time  to  make  ready  for  the  war  which  was  inevi- 
table. But  for  this,  the  insurrectionists  would  have  captured 
Washington  and  made  themselves  masters,  de  facto,  of  the 
Federal  government,  that  of  the  Union  becoming  a  government 
on  horseback,  unable,  perhaps,  ever  to  resume  its  lawful  powers. 

That  Horace  Greeley's  far-seeing  efforts  in  prevention  of  a 
catastrophe  so  direful  should  have  subjected  him  to  obloquy, 
to  cruel  misrepresentation  on  the  part  of  careless  thinkers  and 
heated  politicians,  it  is  not  difficult  to  understand.  That  Mr. 
Tliurlow  Weed  should  undertake  to  add  to  the  obloquy  and 
perpetuate  the  misrepresentation  must  be  regarded  as  a  proof 
of  singular  carelessness  or  uncommon  malignity  worthy  of  the 
severest  rebuke. 

In  the  early  part  of  1861,  Mr.  Greeley  became  a  candidate 
before  the  Republican  caucus  of  the  New  York  Legislature  for 
United  States  Senator.  His  competitor  was  Mr.  William  M. 
Evarts,  but  the  contest  was  in  reality  one  between  the  Seward 
and  Weed  wing  of  the  party  in  the  State  and  the  Greeley  wing. 
There  was  a  great  deal  of  excitement  in  the  party  upon  the 
subject,  and  especially  among  "  party  managers."  There  has 
never  been,  perhaps,  so  excited  a  Senatorial  contest  in  New 
York.  Albany,  the  Capital,  swarmed  with  politicians,  though 
Mr.  Greeley  himself  did  not  go  near.  He  quietly  pursued  his 
business,  as  though  nothing  unusual  were  going  on.  Mr. 
Weed  was  in  Albany,  and  had  to  use  all  his  great  sagacity  and 
political  resource  in  order  to  win  this  "  return  match  "  with 
Mr.  Greeley.  He  only  succeeded  so  far  as  to  defeat  Mr. 
Greeley  by  consenting  to  the  defeat  of  Mr.  Evarts.  The  Hon. 
Ira  Harris,  who  had  received  a  few  votes  from  the  commence- 


394  LIFE  OF   HORACE   OEEELEY. 

ment,  was  nominated  on  the  tenth  ballot.  Mr.  Weed  was 
present  in  the  Capitol,  and  managed  the  contest  with  all  his 
old  vigour,  imperturbability,  and  adroitness.  At  his  com- 
mand, the  Evarts  men  marched  over  to  Judge  Harris  in  full 
force  and  with  military  precision.  Mr.  Weed  was  among 
those  who  afterwards  came  to  regret  the  election  of  Judge 
Harris.  Adroit  political  gamesters  no  doubt  have  such  regrets 
upon  their  consciences  more  frequently  than  they  confess 
them. 

The  course  of  The  Tribune  during  the  early  part  of  the 
actual  conflict  of  arms  was  notable  for  a  vehement  advocacy  of 
offensive  prosecution  of  the  war.  "Forward  to  Richmond!" 
was  a  phrase  originating  with  The  Tribune  but  not  with  Mr. 
Greeley.  If  my  memory  is  not  at  fault,  it  originated  with 
Mr.  Fitz  Henry  Warren,  associate  editor  of  The  Tribune,  and 
at  the  time  that  journal's  "  own  correspondent "  at  the  Na- 
tional Capital.  Mr.  Warren's  letters  of  this  period  were 
remarkable  productions, —  remarkable  on  account  of  their  caus- 
tic criticisms  on  the  conduct  of  affairs,  of  public  men,  their 
brilliant  style,  their  stinging  wit,  their  independent  spirit. 
If  so  magnificent  a  series  of  letters  has  appeared  in  modern 
journalism  their  author  has  escaped  deserved  reputation. 

Mr.  Warren  had  apartments  on  Pennsylvania  avenue,  oppo- 
site Willards'  Hotel,  only  a  short  distance  from  "  Newspaper 
Row  "  on  Fourteenth  street.  Here  congregated,  almost  every 
evening,  not  a  few  persons,  then  and  since  highly  distin- 
guished in  the  civil  or  military  history  of  the  republic. 
They  formed  from  evening  to  evening  a  sort  of  extemporane- 
ous  club  of  critics.  On  account  of  their  free  expressions  of 
opinion  touching  the  illustrious  General  then  in  command  of 
the  Union  army,  and  whose  mind  they  thought  had  become 
impaired  through  great  age,  they  were  often  called  "  the  cuss- 
ers"  by  irreverent  reporters.  Here  assembled  Senators  of 
the  United  States,  Representatives  in  Congress,  many  eminent 
men  of  the  land  visiting  Washington.  There  was  general 
acquiescence  in  Mr.  Warren's  opinion  that  the  war  ought  to 
be  short  and  sharp;  and  especially  was  it  generally  felt  that 
the  confederate  capital  ought  not  to  be  allowed  to  remain  at 


"ON  TO  RICHMOND."  395 

Iftchmond.  "On  to  Kichmond ! "  was,  therefore,  a  popular 
phrase  with  the  extemporaneous  Club.  It  frequently  ap- 
peared in  The  Tribune,  and  was  made  the  basis  of  no  little 
obloquy  for  Mr.  Greeley  after  the  defeat  of  the  Battle  of  Bull 
Run  in  July,  1861. 

In  truth,  this  disaster  was  the  result  of  that  very  military 
incapacity  which  Mr.  Warren  and  The  Tribune  had  criticised. 
To  the  criticisms  made  upon  The  Tribune  for  its  military 
incapacity  as  manifested  in  the  "  on  to  Richmond  "  strategy, 
Mr.  Greeley  replied  in  the  famous  article  "Just  Once,"  as 
follows: 

An  individual's  griefs  or  wrongs  may  be  of  little  account  to  others;  but 
•when  the  gravest  public  interests  are  imperilled  through  personal  attacks, 
and  the  coarsest  imputations  of  base  motives,  the  assailed,  however  hum- 
ble, owes  duties  to  others  which  cannot  be  disregarded.  I  propose  here  to 
refute  months  of  persistent  and  envenomed  defamation  by  the  statement 
of  a  few  facts. 

I  am  charged  with  having  opposed  the  selection  of  Governor  Seward  for 
a  place  in  President  Lincoln's  cabinet.  That  is  utterly,  absolutely  false, 
the  President  himself  being  my  witness.  I  might  call  many  others,  but 
one  such  is  sufficient. 

I  am  charged  with  what  is  called  "opposing  the  administration  "  because 
of  that  selection,  and  various  paragraphs  which  have  from  time  to  time 
appeared  in  The  Tribune  are  quoted  to  sustain  this  inculpation.  The 
simple  fact  that  not  one  of  those  paragraphs  was  either  written  or  in  any 
wise  suggested  or  prompted  by  me  suffices  for  that  charge.  It  is  true — I 
have  no  desire  to  conceal  or  belittle  it  —  that  my  ideas  as  to  the  general  con- 
duct of  the  war  for  the  Union  are  those  repeatedly  expressed  by  myself  and 
others  through  The  Tribune,  and  of  course  are  not  those  on  which  the 
conduct  of  that  war  has  been  based.  It  is  true  that  I  hold  and  have  urged 
that  this  war  can  not,  must  not,  be  a  long  one ;  that  it  must  be  prosecuted 
with  the  utmost  energy,  promptness,  and  vigour,  or  it  will  prove  a  failure ; 
that  every  week's  flying  of  the  secession  flag  defiantly  within  a  day's  walk 
of  "Washington  renders  the  suppression  of  the  revolt  more  difficult,  if  not 
doubtful.  It  is  true  that  I  think  a  government  that  begins  the  work  of 
putting  down  a  rebellion  by  forming  "  camps  of  instruction,"  or  any  thing 
of  that  sort,  is  likely  to  make  a  very  long  job  of  it.  It  is  true  that  I  think 
our  obvious  policy,  under  the  circumstances,  would  have  been  to  be  cour- 
teous  and  long-suffering  towards  foreign  powers,  but  resolute  and  ready  in 
our  dealings  with  armed  rebels ;  and  it.  seems  to  me  that  the  opposite  course 
has  been  taken.  But  the  watchword,  "Forward  to  Richmond,"  is  not 
mine,  nor  any  thing  of  like  import.  I  wish  to  evade  no  responsibility, 
but  to  repel  a  personal  aspersion.  So  with  regard  to  the  late  article  urg- 
ing a  change  in  the  cabinet.  While  I  know  that  some  of  the  best  material 


896  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GREELEY. 

in  the  country  enters  into  the  composition  of  that  cabinet,  I  yet  feel  that 
changes  might  be  made  therein  with  advantage  to  the  public  service.  Yet 
I  did  not  write,  and  I  did  not  intend  to  have  published,  the  article  calling 
for  a  change  of  cabinet,  which  only  appeared  through  a  misapprehension. 
I  shrunk  from  printing  it  in  part  because  any  good  effect  it  might  have 
was  likely  to  be  neutralized  by  the  very  course  which  has  been  taken  — 
that  of  assailing  me  as  its  supposed  author. 

I  have  no  desire  in  the  premises  but  that  what  is  best  for  the  country 
shall  be  done.  If  the  public  judge  that  this  great  end  —  an  energetic  and 
successful  prosecution  of  the  war  —  will  be  most  surely  subserved  by  retain, 
ing  the  cabinet  as  it  is,  I  acquiesce  in  that  decision.  The  end  being 
secured,  the  means  are  to  me  utterly  indifferent. 

I  wish  to  be  distinctly  understood  as  not  seeking  to  be  relieved  from  any 
responsibility  for  urging  the  advance  of  the  Union  grand  army  into  Vir- 
ginia, though  the  precise  phrase,  "Forward  to  Richmond!"  is  not  mine, 
and  I  would  have  preferred  not  to  iterate  it.  I  thought  that  that  army, 
one  hundred  thousand  strong,  might  have  been  in  the  rebel  capital  on  or 
before  the  20th  instant,  while  I  felt  that  there  were  urgent  reasons  why  it 
should  be  there  if  possible.  And  now,  if  any  one  imagine  that  I,  or  any 
one  connected  with  The  Tribune,  ever  commended  or  imagined  such 
strategy  as  the  launching  of  barely  thirty  thousand  of  the  one  hundred 
thousand  Union  volunteers  within  fifty  miles  of  Washington  against  ninety 
thousand  rebels  enveloped  in  a  labyrinth  of  strong  intrenchments  and 
unreconnoitred  masked  batteries,  the  demonstration  would  be  lost  on  his 
closed  ear.  But  I  will  not  dwell  on  this.  If  I  am  needed  as  a  scape-goat 
for  all  the  military  blunders  of  the  last  month,  so  be  it.  Individuals  must 
die  that  the  nation  may  live.  If  I  can  serve  her  best  in  that  capacity,  I  do 
not  shrink  from  the  ordeal. 

Henceforth  I  bar  all  criticism  in  these  columns  on  army  movements, 
past  or  future,  unless  somebody  should  undertake  to  prove  that  General 
Patterson  is  a  wise  and  brave  commander.  He  seems  to  have  none  to 
speak  his  praises ;  so,  if  there  is  any  thing  to  be  said  in  his  behalf,  I  will 
make  an  exception  in  his  favour.  Other  than  this,  the  subject  is  closed 
and  sealed.  Correspondents  and  reporters  may  state  facts,  but  must  for- 
bear comments.  I  know  that  there  is  truth  that  yet  needs  be  uttered  on 
this  subject,  but  this  paper  has  done  its  full  share  —  all  that  it  ought,  and 
perhaps  more  than  it  could  afford  to  do  —  and  henceforth  stands  back  for 
others.  Only  I  beg  it  to  be  understood  —  once  for  all — that  if  less  than 
half  the  Union  armies  directly  at  hand  are  hurled  against  all  the  rebel 
forces  that  could  be  concentrated  —  more  than  double  their  number  —  on 
ground  specially  chosen  and  strongly  fortified  by  the  traitors,  The  Tribune 
does  not  approve  and  should  not  be  held  responsible  for  such  madness. 
Say  what  you  will  of  the  past,  but  remember  this  for  the  future,  though  we 
keep  silence. 

Henceforth  it  shall  be  The  Tribune's  sole  vocation  to  rouse  and  animate 
the  American  people  for  the  terrible  ordeal  which  has  befallen  them. 
The  great  republic  eminently  needs  the  utmost  exertions  of  every  loyal 


BULL  RUN.  397 

r 

heart  and  hand.  We  have  tried  to  serve  her  by  exposing  breakers  ahead 
and  around  her ;  henceforth  be  it  ours  to  strengthen,  in  all  possible  ways, 
the  hands  of  those  whose  unenviable  duty  it  is  to  pilot  her  through  them. 
If  more  good  is  thus  to  be  done,  let  us  not  repine  that  some  truth  must  be 
withheld  for  a  calmer  moment,  and  for  less  troubled  ears. 

The  journal  which  is  made  the  conduit  of  the  most  violent  of  these  per- 
sonal assaults  on  me  attributes  the  course  of  The  Tribune  to  resentment 
"  against  those  who  have  ever  committed  the  inexpiable  offense  of  thwart- 
ing Mr.  Greeley's  raging  and  unsatiated  thirst  for  office." 

I  think  this  justifies  me  in  saying  that  there  is  no  office  in  the  gift  of  the 
government  or  of  the  people  which  I  either  hope,  wish,  or  expect  ever  to 
hold.  I  certainly  shall  not  parade  myself  as  declining  places  that  are  not 
offered  for  my  acceptance ;  but  I  am  sure  the  President  has  always  known 
that  I  desired  no  office  at  his  hands;  and  this,  not  through  any  violation 
of  my  rule  above  stated,  but  through  the  report  of  mutual  and  influential 
friends,  who  at  various  times  volunteered  to  ask  me  if  I  would  take  any 
place  whatever  under  the  government,  and  were  uniformly  and  conclu- 
sively assured  that  I  would  not 

Now  let  the  wolves  howl  on.  I  do  not  believe  they  can  goad  me  into 
another  personal  notice  of  their  ravings. 

HORACE  GREELEY. 

July  24, 1861. 

I  have  quoted  thus  fully  from  Mr.  Greeley  upon  this  subject 
not  only  to  show  that  his  policy, — the  policy  of  The  Tribune, — 
of  "Forward  to  Richmond"  was  "Forward  "  and  not  "For- 
ward and  Back;"  but  also  that,  in  connexion  with  Mr.  Gree- 
ley's statement,  I  may  state  the  real  cause  of  the  defeat. 

General  McDowell,  it  will  be  recollected,  moved  against  the 
enemy  from  Arlington  Heights.  General  Patterson,  farther 
up  the  Potomac,  with  the  army  of  the  Shenandoah,  had  it  in 
charge  to  keep  the  rebel  General  Joseph  E.  Johnston  from 
reenforcing  General  Beauregard.  Lieutenant-General  Win- 
field  Scott,  in  command  of  the  Union  armies,  thrice  sent  orders, 
as  he  supposed,  to  Patterson  to  keep  Johnston  near  the  Shenan- 
doah by  hostile  demonstrations,  and,  if  necessary,  by  engaging 
him.  General  Scott  entrusted  all  these  orders  to  a  single  aide, 
of  his  own  name,  and  related  to  him  by  marriage.  They  were 
purposely  withheld,  that  Johnston  might  get  away  from  Pat- 
terson. It  was  this  treason  in  General  Scott's  military  family 
which  was  the  direct  cause  of  the  defeat  of  the  Union  army  at 
Bull  Run.  For,  as  is  well  known,  the  victory  was  with  Gen- 
eral McDowell,  in  immediate  command  of  the  Unionists,  till 


898  LIFE  OF  HOBACE  GREELET. 

these  reinforcements  of  Beauregard  changed  the  result.  That 
General  Scott  would  not  have  trusted  such  important  order  to 
a  single  person,  had  age  not  impaired  his  faculties,  will  not  be 
disputed.  In  shame  and  sorrow,  he  at  once  sought  to  be 
relieved,  whilst  his  culpable  aide  left  America,  and  tried  to 
drown  his  compunctions,  or  escape  punishment,  in  the  gayeties 
of  the  French  Capital. 

But  for  this  lamentable  want  of  vigilance  on  the  part  of  the 
Commander-in-Chief,  Bull  Run  would  have  been  a  victory,  and 
"On  to  Richmond"  eulogised  as  the  finest  strategy.  The 
cause  of  the  failure  of  Patterson  being  unknown  until  long 
afterwards,  he  and  others  suffered  greatly  in  consequence. 
But  with  the  public  Horace  Greeley  was  made  to  play  the 
character  of  the  chief  scape-goat. 

But  even  had  there  been  no  treachery  at  headquwters,  the 
assaults  upon  Mr.  Greeley  and  The  Tribune  were  still  inex- 
cusably unjust.  Though  General  Patterson  must  be  relieved 
of  the  blame  which  was  cast  upon  him, — by  Mr,  Greeley  as 
well  as  by  others, — the  fault  should  not  have  been  placed  upon 
The  Tribune.  The  Union  army  was  strong  in  numbers,  en- 
thusiastic, brave.  It  was  in  all  respects  superior  to  its  enemy. 
Three  years  afterwards,  the  country  universally  applauded 
General  Grant's  dispatch  which  said  "I  shall  fight  it  out  on 
this  line  if  it  takes  all  Summer,"  though  he  /ailed  to  fight  it 
out  on  that  line,  and  though  it  took  much  more  than  all  Sum- 
mer. This  famous  saying  cost  the  country  immensely  more 
life  and  treasure  than  the  other:  and,  based  upon  a  more 
thorough  knowledge  of  our  own  and  the  enemy's  resources, 
and  ot  the  capacity  of  our  troops  to  march  and  fight,  it  had  no 
foundation  but  boastfulness,  with  the  object  to  deceive.  It 
was,  therefore,  well.  But  "  On  to  Richmond  "  in  1861  was 
wiser  than  Grant's  dispatch  of  1864.  Had  Grant  not  been 
more  vigilant  and  capable  than  Scott  had  become  in  1861,  he 
would  still  be  fighting  it  out,  or  else  peace  would  have  been 
proclaimed  over  the  ruins  of  the  Republic,  and  in  a  terrible 
calamity  to  mankind.  Had  "  On  to  Richmond  "  been  fought 
for  as  the  other  saying,  the  rebellion  would  then  and  there 
have  suffered  utter  discomfiture. 


SIMON   CAMERON.  399 

But  at  whatsoever  conclusions  we  may  arrive  upon  this  sub- 
ject, it  is  certain  that  the  result  of  the  battle  of  Bull  Run  was 
received  with  general  consternation  by  the  North.  There  was, 
if  I  may  so  speak,  a  brief  popular  panic.  One  consequence  of 
this  was, — to  use  a  word  whereby  gentlemen  in  the  War 
Department  described  the  situation  of  General  Rosecrans  after 
the  battle  of  Chickamauga, — Mr.  Greeley  was  "  stampeded." 
The  national  calamity  overpowered  him  for  the  time  being. 
He  became  ill,  and  was  for  some  time  dangerously  sick. 

We  have  already  seen  what  he  wrote  two  days  after  the 
battle.  Mr.  Dana  and  Mr.  Warren,  unwilling  to  acknowledge 
that  any  blame  whatever  attached  to  The  Tribune,  indignant 
that  it  should  even  so  far  recognize  the  popular  clamour  as  to 
change  its  policy,  retired  from  the  paper.  I  suppose  both 
those  gentlemen  have  never  ceased  to  think  that  herein  and 
not  in  "  On  to  Richmond,"  did  The  Tribune  err.  In  truth 
they  were  in  the  right:  but  in  view  of  the  military  disaster 
and  the  national  consternation,  it  was  wise  in  Mr.  Greeley  to 
bend  to  the  storm. 

During  the  early  part  of  the  rebellion,  Mr.  Simon  Cameron, 
of  Pennsylvania,  was  Secretary  of  War.  He  was  given  this 
position  in  President  Lincoln's  cabinet,  contrary  to  the  Presi- 
dent's judgment,  but  in  fulfillment  of  certain  pledges  made 
without  authority  by  Mr.  Lincoln's  friends  at  the  Chicago 
convention.  There  was  no  one  man  with  eminent  position  in 
American  affairs,  who  had  done  so  much,  perhaps,  to  corrupt 
politics  as  Mr.  Cameron.  He  was  once  described  in  a  speech 
by  a  distinguished  Representative  in  Congress  as  a  man  of  a 
single  virtue  and  a  thousand  crimes.  That  Mr.  Lincoln  was 
annoyed  by  his  presence  in  the  Cabinet  there  is  no  doubt. 
That  he  conducted  the  War  Office  in  the  interest  of  contractors 
and  for  the  furtherance  of  jobs  there  will  be  few  to  dispute. 
A  more  unfortunate  head  for  the  department  of  war  could  not 
easily  have  been  selected.  President  Lincoln  endured  his 
incapacity  so  long  as  even  his  sublime  good-nature  could  hold 
out,  and  then  banished  him  to  St.  Petersburg,  where  he  per- 
formed the  easy  functions  of  a  minister  at  a  friendly  court. 

It  was  early  in  1862  that  Mr.  Cameron  retired  from  the  War 


400  TJint  OF   HORACE  GEEELEY. 

Department.  He  was  succeeded  by  Mr.  Edwin  M.  Stanton,  at 
tliat  time  not  generally  known  throughout  the  country,  but 
whose  name  soon  became  illustrious  as  that  of  the  great  War 
Secretary.  Mr.  Stanton  had  ever  been  in  politics  a  member 
of  the  Democratic  party.  His  appointment  was  intended  not 
only  as  a  recognition  of  his  talents  and  patriotism  but  as  a 
manifestation  also  of  a  determination  on  the  part  of  the  Presi- 
dent to  give  his  administration  a  non-partisan  character.  And 
so  it  was  gracefully  accepted  by  a  large  portion  of  the  Demo- 
cratic party,  and  by  the  public  generally. 

The  military  operations  of  the  year  1861  had  been,  upon  the 
whole,  disastrous  to  the  Union  cause.  There  had  also  appeared 
on  th«  part  of  the  government  a  want  of  earnestness ;  a  kind 
of  good-natured  attempt  to  carry  on  the  war  on  peace  princi- 
ples. General  Butler  and  General  Fremont  had  not  been 
sustained  in  certain  measures  of  a  vigorous  nature  adopted 
by  them;  and,  generally,  we  seemed  to  be  afraid  that  the 
rebellion  might  be  too  much  hurt.  The  treatment  it  received 
was  notably  mild  and  tender.  In  consequence  whereof  the 
people  of  the  North  began  to  be  not  a  little  disheartened. 

That  much  of  the  responsibility  for  the  unfortunate  situation 
was  justly  chargeable  to  incapacity  in  the  management  of  the 
Department  of  War,  there  can  be  few  to  question.  Mr.  Cameron 
gave  a  great  deal  more  attention  to  contracts  for  the  most 
ephemeral  of  army  hats  than  he  gave  to  ways  and  means  for 
the  prosecution  of  the  war.  He  acted  very  much  as  though 
the  office  of  Secretary  of  War  were  identical  with  that  of  a 
depot  quartermaster  or  a  commissary  of  subsistence.  Many 
commenced  shrewdly  to  surmise  that  we  were  engaged  not  in 
a  war,  but  a  speculation.  I  do  not  impeach  the  civil  capacity 
of  Simon  Cameron;  but  it  seems  as  though  it  were  hardly 
possible  a  more  unfortunate  selection  COL  id  have  been  made  for 
the  head  of  the  War  Department  in  a  time  of  war. 

The  appointment  of  Mr.  Stanton  instantly  changed  and 
invigorated  the  national  heart,  and  evoked  the  general  patriot- 
ism to  renewed  fervour.  Mr.  Greeley,  who  had  been  greatly 
depressed  in  spirit  for  many  months,  at  once  resumed  hia 
wonted  ardour,  and  again  The  Tribune's  voice  rang  loud  and 


EDWIN  M.  STANTON. 


EDWIN  M.  OTAinON.  401 


clear  like  a  trumpet  sounding  the  charge.    The  Tribune  of 
February  18,  1862,  said: 

While  every  honest  heart  rises  in  gratitude  to  God  for  the  victories 
which  afford  so  glorious  a  guaranty  of  the  national  salvation,  let  it  not  be 
forgotten  that  it  is  to  Edwin  M.  Stanton,  more  than  to  any  other  indi 
vidual,  that  these  auspicious  events  are  now  due.  Our  generals  in  the 
field  have  done  their  duty  with  energy  and  courage  :  our  officers,  and  with 
them  the  noble  democracy  of  the  ranks,  have  proved  themselves  worthy 
sons  of  the  Republic  ;  but  it  is  by  the  impassionate  soul,  the  sleepless 
will,  and  the  great  practical  talents  of  the  Secretary  of  War,  that  the  vast 
power  of  the  United  States  has  now  been  hurled  upon  their  treacherous 
and  perjured  enemies  to  crush  them  to  powder.  Let  no  man  imagine  that 
we  exalt  this  great  statesman  above  his  deserts,  or  that  we  would  detract 
an  iota  from  that  share  of  glory  which  in  this  momentous  crisis  belongs 
to  every  faithful  participator  in  the  events  of  this  war.  But  we  cannot 
overlook  the  fact  that  whereas  but  the  other  day  all  was  doubt,  distrust, 
and  uncertainty  ;  the  nation  despairing  almost  of  its  own  restoration  to 
life;  Congress  the  scene  of  bitter  imputations  and  unsatisfactory  apolo- 
gies; the  army  sluggish,  discontented,  and  decaying;  and  the  abyss  of 
ruin  and  disgrace  yawning  to  swallow  us  —  now  all  is  inspiration,  merri- 
merit,  victory,  and  confidence.  We  seem  to  have  passed  into  another  state 
of  existence,  to  live  with  distinct  purposes,  and  to  feel  the  certainty  of 
their  realization. 

To  which  Secretary  Stanton  replied: 

WASHINOTOIT,  February  19,  1862. 
To  the  Editor  of  The  New-  York  Tribune: 

SIR:  —  I  cannot  suffer  undue  merit  to  be  ascribed  to  my  official  action. 
The  glory  of  our  recent  victories  belongs  to  our  gallant  officers  and 
soldiers  that  fought  the  battles.  No  share  of  it  belongs  to  me. 

Much  has  lately  been  said  of  military  combinations  and  organizing 
victory.  I  hear  such  phrases  with  apprehension.  They  commenced  in 
infidel  France  with  the  Italian  campaign,  and  resulted  in  Waterloo.  Who 
can  organize  victory?  Who  can  combine  the  elements  of  success  on  the 
battle-field  ?  We  owe  our  recent  victories  to  the  Spirit  of  the  Lord,  that 
moved  our  soldiers  to  rush  into  battle,  and  filled  the  hearts  of  our  enemies 
with  terror  and  dismay.  The  inspiration  that  conquered  in  battle  was  in 
the  hearts  of  the  soldiers,  and  from  on  high  ;  and  wherever  there  is  the 
same  inspiration  there  will  be  the  same  results.  Patriotic  spirit,  with 
resolute  courage  in  officers  and  men,  is  a  military  combination  that  never 
failed. 

We  may  well  rejoice  at  the  recent  victories,  for  they  teach  us  that  battle? 
are  to  be  won  now  and  by  us  in  the  same  and  only  manner  that  they  were 
ever  won  by  any  people  or  in  any  age,  since  the  days  of  Joshua,  by  boldly 
pursuing  and  striking  the  foe.  What,  under  the  blessing  of  Providence,  I 

26 


402  LEFB  OF   HORACE  GRKELET. 

conceive  to  be  the  true  organization  of  victory  and  military  combination 
to  end  this  war,  was  declared  in  a  few  words  by  General  Grant's  message 
to  General  Buckner — "I propose  to  move  immediately  on  your  toorfa." 

Yours,  truly,  EDWTO  M.  STANTOS. 

The  Tribune,  in  response,  epoke  of  Mr.  Stanton's  modesty 
and  unaffected  religious  feeling.  It  admitted  that  he  was 
right,  too.  The  favourable  change  in  our  affairs  was  due  t 
God  and  the  people  alone.  Nevertheless,  it  said,  if  Mr.  Stan- 
ton  has  not  organized  victory,  he  has  at  least  unwound  it  and 
set  it  in  motion. 

It  might  almost  seem  that  the  appointment  of  Mr.  Stanton 
was  a  providential  event.  Mr.  Lincoln  was  a  man  of  peace. 
Mr.  Stanton  might  almost  be  described  as  the  incarnation  of 
war.  He  was  Mars  modernized.  No  man  was  ever  more 
terribly  in  earnest  His  acts  were  sometimes  harsh,  even 
grossly  unjust  in  individual  cases ;  but  harshness  had  become 
a  necessity,  and  his  injustice  to  persons  rarely  if  ever  resulted 
in  ill  to  the  country.  No  man  ever  braved  unfavourable 
opinion  as  Secretary  Stanton  braved  it.  I  believe  he  would 
cheerfully  have  welcomed  obloquy  if  thereby  he  could  have 
banished  the  paltering  of  politicians  and  aided  to  save  his 
country.  Before  his  dominating  spirit  that  of  President 
Lincoln  bowed  with  a  feeling  akin  to  awe.  By  his  resistless 
energy  and  sleepless  vigilance  the  army  was  organized  for 
victory.  Cheering  triumphs  speedily  followed  his  accession  to 
office.  The  great  crime  of  trifling  was  no  more  committed. 
Thoughtful  men  saw  that  the  preservation  of  the  Union  through 
the  defeat  of  the  rebellion  had  become  only  a  question  of  time. 

In  this  happy  improvement  in  the  posture  of  affairs,  Mr. 
Greeley  did  not  substantially  change  the  policy  of  The  Tribune 
in  respect  to  criticism  of  the  conduct  of  the  war  from  that 
marked  out  in  the  article  "Just  Once,"  already  quoted.  The 
government  was  sustained  with  but  little  qualification  and 
less  unfriendly  criticism.  Scarcely  any  fault  was  found  with 
what  was  done.  It  advocated  the  doing  of  things  before  they 
were  done,  but  without  any  exhibition  of  unseemly  temper  or 
manifestation  of  croaking  complaint.  Aside  from  victories  in 
the  field,  the  two  events  of  the  war  which  coincided  best  with 


EDWIN   M. 


403 


the  policy  of  The  Tribune,  and  were  the  most  gratifying  to  Mr. 
Greeley,  were  the  appointment  of  Edwin  M.  Stan  ton  as  Secretary 
of  War  and  the  Proclamation  of  Emancipation.  The  wisdom 
and  patriotism  of  that  policy  could  hardly  be  more  conclusively 
demonstrated,  since  these  were  the  two  deeds  which,  through 
the  action  of  government,  had  most  to  do  in  bringing  the 
terrible  contest  to  an  issue  favourable  to  the  republic  and  the 
cause  of  human  progress. 


SAMUEL  BOWLES.— See  page  183. 


CHAPTEK   XXIII. 

THE  WAR  OF  THE  REBELLION  CONTINUES. 

Correspondence  with  President  Lincoln— The  Mob  of  1863  — Mr.  Lincoln 
Re-elected  President — General  McClellan  the  Opposing  Candidate  — 
General  Fremont  and  Montgomery  Blair  Withdraw  —  Mr.  Greeley's 
"Peace  Negotiations  "—The  Rebel  "  Negotiators  "—The  Military  Cam- 
paigns of  1864-65  under  Grant  and  Sherman — Victory — The  Death  of 
President  Lincoln  —  Horace  Greeley's  Opinion  of  Him  as  a  War  Presi- 
dent—  President  Andrew  Johnson  —  Mr.  Greeley  Undertakes  to  Bring 
About  a  Reconciliation  Between  the  President  and  Congress  —  The 
President  Impeached  —  Failure. 

Bur  so  great  was  the  rebellion,  so  long  had  the  nation  trifled 
with  its  cause,  and  then  on  this  account  with  its  armed  defend- 
ers, that  even  the  most  energetic  and  wise  and  unselfish  of  war 
secretaries,  a  government  proclaiming  freedom  to  millions  of 
slaves,  sustained  by  a  vast  and  brave  army  of  Volunteers,  were 
unable  to  bring  the  conflict  to  a  speedy  termination.  Indeed, 
there  was  great  concern  among  the  most  thoughtful  friends  of 
the  republic,  that  President  Lincoln  would  so  long  remain 
tramelled  by  old  precedents  and  regard  for  technicalities,  that 
it  might  become  too  late  to  save  the  nation,  even  by  the  loftiest 
deeds  of  justice  and  the  most  heroic  fighting.  In  demanding 
emancipation,  the  arming  of  the  blacks,  and  this  with  pro- 
foundest  earnestness,  Horace  Greeley  truly  represented  the 
great  bulk  of  the  reflecting  people  of  the  North,  and  at  the 
same  time  pointed  out  the  means  of  national  preservation. 
There  was  scarcely  a  day  that  he  did  not  urge  emancipation 
upon  the  administration,  and  the  country.  But  on  the  19th 
of  August,  1862,  he  addressed  a  letter,  through  the  columns 
of  The  Tribune,  to  President  Lincoln,  which  had  immediate 
effect.  It  was  entitled  "The  Prayer  of  Twenty  Millions,"  and 
was  one  of  the  most  powerful  essays  which  ever  came  from  the 

J.  V 

pen  of  Horace  Greeley;  one  of  the  most  unanswerable  argu- 
ments and  irresistable  appeals  which  the  human  mind  ever 

(404) 


405 

conceived  or  expressed.     The  concluding  portions  of  this  letter 
were  as  follows: 

On  the  face  of  this  wide  earth,  Mr.  President,  there  is  not  one  disinter- 
ested, determined,  intelligent  champion  of  the  Union  cause  who  does  not 
feel  that  all  attempts  to  put  down  the  Rebellion,  and  at  the  same  time  up- 
hold its  inciting  cause,  are  preposterous  and  futile  —  that  the  Rebellion, 
if  crushed  out  to-morrow,  would  be  renewed  within  a  year  if  Slavery  were 
left  in  full  vigour  —  that  army  officers,  who  remain  to  this  day  devoted  to 
Slavery,  can  at  best  be  but  half-way  loyal  to  the  Union — and  that  every 
hour  of  deference  to  Slavery  is  an  hour  of  added  and  deepened  peril  to  the 
Union.  I  appeal  to  the  testimony  of  your  Ambassadors  in  Europe.  It  is 
freely  at  your  service,  not  mine.  Ask  them  to  tell  you  candidly  whether 
the  seeming  subserviency  of  your  policy  to  the  slaveholding,  Slavery, 
upholding  interest,  is  not  the  perplexity,  the  despair,  of  statesmen  of  all 
parties ;  and  be  admonished  by  the  general  answer ! 

I  close  as  I  began,  with  the  statements  that  what  an  immense  majority 
of  the  loyal  millions  of  your  countrymen  require  of  you  is  a  frank, 
declared,  unqualified,  ungrudging  execution  of  the  laws  of  the  land,  more 
especially  of  the  Confiscation  Act.  That  act  gives  freedom  to  the  slaves 
of  Rebels  coming  within  our  lines,  or  whom  those  lines  may  at  any  time 
inclose — we  ask  you  to  render  it  due  obedience  by  publicly  requiring  all 
your  subordinates  to  recognize  and  obey  it.  The  Rebels  are  everywhere 
using  the  late  anti-negro  riots  in  the  North  — as  they  have  long  used  your 
officers'  treatment  of  negroes  in  the  South — to  convince  the  slaves  that 
they  have  nothing  to  hope  from  a  Union  success  —  that  we  mean  in  that 
case  to  sell  them  into  a  bitter  bondage  to  defray  the  cost  of  the  war.  Let 
them  impress  this  as  a  truth  on  the  great  mass  of  their  ignorant  and  cred- 
ulous bondmen,  and  the  Union  will  never  be  restored — never.  We  can 
not  conquer  ten  million  of  people  united  in  solid  phalanx  against  us, 
powerfully  aided  by  Northern  sympathizers  and  European  allies.  We 
must  have  scouts,  guides,  spies,  cooks,  teamsters,  diggers,  and  choppers, 
from  the  Blacks  of  the  South  —  whether  we  allow  them  to  fight  for  us  or 
not — or  we  shall  be  baffled  and  repelled.  As  one  of  the  millions  who 
would  gladly  have  avoided  this  struggle  at  any  sacrifice  but  that  of  prin- 
ciple and  honour,  but  who  now  feel  that  the  triumph  of  the  Union  is 
indispensible  not  only  to  the  existence  of  our  country,  but  to  the  well- 
being  of  mankind,  I  entreat  you  to  render  a  hearty  and  unequivocal 
obedience  to  the  law  of  the  land. 

Yours,  HORACE  GKEELEY. 

This  letter  made  a  profound  impression  upon  the  country, 
and  at  once.  It  also  made  a  profound  impression  upon  Presi- 
dent Lincoln.  He  perceived  that  it  merited  consideration  and 
response.  He  replied  to  it  as  follows: 


406  LIFE  OF  HORACE  QKEELET. 

EXECUTIVE  MANSION,  WASHINGTON,  August  22, 1862. 
HON.  HORACE  GREELET: — 

DEAR  SIR:  —  I  have  just  read  yours  of  the  19th,  addressed  to  myself 
through  The  New- York  Tribune.  If  there  be  in  it  any  statements  or 
assumptions  of  fact  which  I  may  know  to  be  erroneous,  I  do  not  now  and 
here  controvert  them.  If  there  be  in  it  any  inferences  which  I  may  believe 
to  be  falsely  drawn,  I  do  not  now  and  here  argue  against  them.  If  there 
be  perceptible  in  it  an  impatient  and  dictatorial  tone,  I  waive  it  in  defer 
ence  to  an  old  friend,  whose  heart  I  have  always  supposed  to  be  right. 

As  to  the  policy  I  "  seem  to  be  pursuing,"  as  you  say,  I  have  not  meant  to 
leave  any  one  in  doubt. 

I  would  save  the  Union.  I  would  save  it  the  shortest  way  under  the 
Constitution.  The  sooner  the  national  authority  can  be  restored,  the 
nearer  the  TJnion  will  be  "  the  Union  as  it  was."  If  there  be  those  who 
would  not  save  the  Union  unless  they  could  at  the  same  time  save  slavery, 
I  do  not  agree  with  them.  If  there  be  those  who  would  not  save  the 
Union  unless  they  could  at  the  same  time  destroy  slavery,  I  do  not  agree 
with  them.  My  paramount  object  in  this  struggle  is  to  save  the  Union, 
and  is  not  either  to  save  or  destroy  slavery.  If  I  could  save  the  Unioa 
without  freeing  any  slave  I  would  do  it;  and  if  I  could  save  it  by  freeing 
all  the  slaves,  I  would  do  it ;  and  if  I  could  do  it  by  freeing  some  and 
leaving  others  alone,  I  would  also  do  that.  What  I  do  about  slavery  and 
the  coloured  race,  I  do  because  I  believe  it  helps  to  save  this  Union ;  and 
what  I  forbear,  I  forbear  because  I  do  not  believe  it  would  help  to  save  the 
Union.  I  shall  do  less  whenever  I  shall  believe  what  I  am  doing  hurts  the 
cause,  and  I  shall  do  more  whenever  I  shall  believe  doing  more  will  help 
the  cause.  I  shall  try  to  correct  errors  when  shown  to  be  errors ;  and  I 
shall  adopt  new  views  so  fast  as  they  shall  appear  to  be  true  views.  I  have 
here  stated  my  purpose  according  to  my  view  of  official  duty,  and  I  intend 
no  modification  of  my  oft-expressed  personal  wish  that  all  men,  every. 
where,  could  be  free. 

Tours,  A.  LINCOLN. 

To  which  Mr.  Greeley  speedily  responded: 

To  THE  PRESIDENT: — 

DEAR  SIR  :— Although  I  did  not  anticipate  nor  seek  any  reply  to  my 
former  letter  unless  through  your  official  acts,  I  thank  you  for  having 
accorded  one,  since  it  enables  me  to  say  explicitly  that  nothing  was  further 
from  my  thought  than  to  impeach  in  any  manner  the  sincerity  or  the  inten- 
sity of  your  devotion  to  the  saving  of  the  Union.  I  never  doubted,  and 
have  no  friend  who  doubts,  that  you  desire,  before  and  above  all  else,  to  re- 
establish the  now  derided  authority,  and  vindicate  the  territorial  integrity, 
of  the  Republic.  I  intended  to  raise  only  this  question,  —  Do  you  propose 
to  do  this  by  recognizing,  obeying,  and  enforcing  the  laws,  or  by  ignoring, 
disregarding,  and  in  effect  defying  them  ? 

I  stand  upon  the  law  of  the  land.    The  humblest  has  a  clear  right  to 


LETTER  TO   PRESIDENT   LINCOLN.  407 

invoke  its  protection  and  support  against  even  the  highest.  That  law  — 
in  strict  accordance  with  the  law  of  nations,  of  Nature,  and  of  God  — 
declares  that  every  traitor  now  engaged  in  the  infernal  work  of  destroying 
our  country  has  forfeited  thereby  all  claim  or  colour  of  right  lawfully  to 
hold  human  beings  in  slavery.  I  ask  of  you  a  clear  and  public  recogni- 
tion that  this  law  is  to  be  obeyed  wherever  the  national  authority  is 
respected.  I  cite  you  to  instances  wherein  men  fleeing  from  bondage  to 
traitors  to  the  protection  of  our  flag  have  been  assaulted,  wounded,  and 
murdered  by  soldiers  of  the  Union,  unpunished  and  uurebuked  by  your 
General  Commanding,  —  to  prove  that  it  is  your  duty  to  take  action  in  the 
premises,  —  action  that  will  cause  the  law  to  be  proclaimed  and  obeyed 
wherever  your  authority  or  that  of  the  Union  is  recognized  as  paramount. 
The  Rebellion  is  strengthened,  the  national  cause  is  imperilled,  by  every 
hour's  delay  to  strike  Treason  this  staggering  blow. 

When  Fremont  proclaimed  freedom  to  the  slaves  of  rebels,  you  con- 
strained him  to  modify  his  proclamation  into  rigid  accordance  with  the 
terms  of  the  existing  law.  It  was  your  clear  right  to  do  so.  1  now  ask  of 
you  conformity  to  the  principle  so  sternly  enforced  upon  him.  I  ask  jrou 
to  instruct  your  generals  and  commodores,  that  no  loyal  person — certainly 
none  willing  to  render  service  to  the  national  cause — is  henceforth  to  be 
regarded  as  the  slave  of  any  traitor.  While  no  rightful  government  waa 
ever  before  assailed  by  so  wanton  and  wicked  a  rebellion  as  that  of  the 
slaveholders  against  our  national  life,  I  am  sure  none  ever  before  hesitated 
at  so  simple  and  primary  an  act  of  self  defence,  as  to  relieve  those  who  would 
serve  and  save  it  from  chattel  servitude  to  those  who  are  wading  through 
seas  of  blood  to  subvert  it.  Future  generations  will  with  difficulty  realize 
that  there  could  have  been  hesitation  on  this  point.  Sixty  years  of  general 
and  boundless  subserviency  to  the  slave  power  do  not  adequately  explain  it. 

Mr.  President,  I  beseech  you  to  open  your  eyes  to  the  fact  that  the 
devotees  of  slavery  everywhere — just,  as  much  in  Maryland  as  in  Missis- 
sippi, in  Washington  as  in  Richmond  —  are  to-day  your  enemies,  and  the 
implacable  foes  of  every  effort  to  re-establish  the  national  authority  by  the 
discomfiture  of  its  assailants.  Their  President  is  not  Abraham  Lincoln, 
but  Jefferson  Davis.  You  may  draft  them  to  serve  in  the  war ;  but  they 
will  only  fight  under  the  Rebel  flag.  There  is  not  in  New- York  to-day  a 
man  who  really  believes  in  slavery,  loves  it,  and  desires  its  perpetuation, 
who  heartily  desires  the  crushing  out  of  the  Rebellion.  He  would  much 
rather  save  the  Republic  by  buying  up  and  pensioning  off  its  assailants. 
His  "  Union  as  it  was  "  is  a  Union  of  which  you  were  not  President,  and 
no  one  who  truly  wished  freedom  to  all  ever  could  be. 

If  these  are  truths,  Mr.  President,  they  are  surely  of  the  gravest  impor. 
tance.  You  cannot  safely  approach  the  great  and  good  end  you  so  intently 
meditate  by  shutting  your  eyes  to  them.  Your  deadly  foe  is  not  blinded 
by  any  mist  in  which  your  eyes  may  be  enveloped.  He  walks  straight  to 
his  goal,  knowing  well  his  weak  point,  and  most  unwillingly  betraying  his 
fear  that  you  too  may  see  and  take  advantage  of  it.  God  grant  that  hii 
apprehension  may  prove  prophetic  1 


408  I1FK  OTT  HORACE   OREELEY. 

That  you  may  rof.  unseasonably  -» ',r/'p'TrP  fiese  ~jtal  truths  as  they  will 
ehine  forth  on  the  pages  of  histotT,—  mai  they  may  be  read  by  our  chil- 
dren irradiated  by  the  gloiy  of  cur  national  salvation,  not  rendered  lurid 
by  the  blood-red  glow  of  national  conflagration  and  ruin, —  that  you  may 
promptly  and  practically  realize  that  slavery  is  to  be  vanquished  only  by 
liberty,  —  is  the  fervent  an-1  anxious  prayer  of 

"Sours  truly,  HORACE  GREELEY. 

NEW-YORK,  August  24, 1862. 

"Within  one  month  from  the  publication  of  this  letter  in  The 
Tribune,  President  Lincoln  issued  the  Prodamation  of  Eman- 
cipation. 

An  act  of  greater  beneficence  or  of  graver  responsibility 
history  has  rarely  if  ever  recorded.  Mr.  Greeley  did  not  over- 
estimate its  importance  in  cheering  the  hearts  of  the  great 
body  of  anti-slavery  people.  There  had  been  much  in  the 
course  of  the  administration  to  cause  the  large  and  influential 
class  here  referred  to  to  become  despondent,  at  times  almost  to 
despair  of  the  republic.  If  they  had  had  that  responsibility 
which  was  constantly  weighing  upon  President  Lincoln,  they 
might  not,  indeed,  have  been  as  wisely  cautious  as  he,  but  they 
would  have  been  more  carefully  considerate  of  the  character 
of  their  great  acts  than  of  their  great  words.  The  President 
was  sure  that,  in  his  endeavours  to  save  the  Union,  in  the  man- 
ner marked  out  by  his  best  judgment,  he  would  be  heartily 
sustained,  though  he  might  also  be  freely  criticised,  by  anti- 
slavery  men  generally.  He  could  not  be  certain  of  the  effect 
a  Proclamation  of  Emancipation  might  have  upon  many 
thousands  who  claimed  to  be  friends  of  the  Union,  but  who 
were  not  anti-slavery.  Nor  could  he  be  certain  of  the  advantage 
which  might  be  taken,  in  the  North,  of  such  an  extraordinary 
act,  by  disunionists  in  that  section. 

Events  justified  the  wisdom  of  Horace  Greeley's  policy  and 
of  President  Lincoln's  considerate  caution.  Emancipation 
called  forth  the  most  desperate  efforts  of  the  rebellion,  and  the 
irresistible  power  of  a  free  Union.  One  of  the  most  notable 
evidences  of  the  desperation  in  which  Emancipation  placed 
the  disunionists  was  afforded  by  the  anti-draft,  anti-negro  riots 
which  occurred  in  the  city  of  New- York  in  July,  1863. 

It  would  appear  that  this  destructive  and  bloody  6meute  was 


UW-YORX   RIOTS  OF    1863.  409 

ihe  cuhnin&tioii  of  dlsr.ai.cn  desperation;  that  desperation, 
feared  so  much  by  President  Lincoln,  which  was  a  logical  result 
of  Emancipation.  The  proclamation  was  followed  by  political 
disaster.  Ir  the  elections  which  soon  took  place,  there  seemed 
to  be  little  to  encourage  the  Union  causa.  New  York  elected 
Mr.  Horatio  Seymour  its  Governor  over  a  Union  General  by 
some  10,000  majority.  Several  other  States  which  had  voted 
for  Mr.  Lincoln  in  1860,  also  now  went  against  him.  In  the 
choice  of  Representatives  in  Congress,  many  Republicans  were 
ousted  and  Democrats  elected  in  place  of  them. 

Men  began  to  say  that  Emancipation  had  been  a  mistake;  that 
it  was  not  sustained  by  the  people,  after  all ;  that  old  prejudices, 
old  party  associations  would  belittle  the  sublimest  act  of  the 
century  and  permit  the  republic  to  be  lost;  that  in  spite  of 
right,  reason,  justice,  the  nation  was  not  ready  for  freedom. 
These  despondent  citizens  were  not  encouraged  by  notable  mil- 
itary successes.  The  darkest  period  of  the  war  was  that  which 
followed  Emancipation.  Mr.  Greeley  says  in  his  "  American 
Conflict:"  "Perhaps  the  very  darkest  days  that  the  Republic 
ever  saw  were  the  ten  which  just  preceded  the  4th  of  July, 
1863."  No  one  can  doubt  the  correctness  of  this  judgment. 
It  was  the  intense  darkness  which  precedes  the  dawn.  There 
was  a  certain  weakness  in  the  very  strength  of  Emancipation — 
the  weakness  of  faith  without  works.  The  Unionists,  gratified 
with  the  acknowledgement  of  the  grand  idea,  pretermitted  that 
grand  work  which  was  still  necessary  for  its  realization.  In 
their  desperation,  the  disunionists  left  no  one  thing  undone 
which  they  could  do,  whether  in  war  or  in  politics,  and  in  both 
seemed  to  be  making  headway  against  the  republic  and  eman- 
cipation. It  was  not  until  they  had  made  considerable  progress 
and  had  imposed  upon  thousands  of  Union  men,  who  were, 
however,  not  anti-slavery,  that  the  irresistible  power  of  Eman- 
cipation became  manifest. 

Unquestionably  the  New- York  riots  did  very  much  to 
demonstrate  the  nature  of  the  contest  in  which  we  were  en- 
gaged. After  that  terrible  week  there  could  be  no  mistake. 
And  after  that  week,  the  fate  of  the  rebellion  was  sealed.  Its 


410  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

complete  suppression,  and  the  vindication  of  the  republic, 
through  freedom,  thenceforth  was  but  a  question  of  time. 

The  pretext  of  this  riot  was  the  enforcement  of  the  draft 
for  soldiers  which,  in  accordance  with  law,  had  been  ordered 
by  the  government.  The  mob  first  assailed  the  building  in 
which  the  drawing  in  one  of  the  districts  was  taking  place. 
The  officers  were  dispersed,  the  building  set  on  fire.  Increasing 
in  numbers,  the  rioters  proceeded  to  commit  acts  of  violence, 
arson,  and  bloodshed,  which  placed  the  city  in  general  terror. 
The  fearful  work  continued  for  four  days,  during  which  period 
property  to  the  value  of  several  millions  was  destroyed,  and 
many  murders,  chiefly  of  blacks,  committed  under  circum- 
stances of  savage  atrocity.  The  office  of  The  Tribune  was 
attacked  on  the  evening  of  the  first  day  of  the  riot,  the  count- 
ing-room entered,  sacked,  and  set  on  fire,  but  energetic  action 
on  the  part  of  the  police  drove  off  the  mob,  and  thereafter, 
having  procured  arms  and  amunition  in  abundance,  the  office 
was  able  to  take  care  of  itself.  It  was  constantly  surrounded, 
however,  by  the  surging,  howling  mob,  which,  unquestionably, 
thirsted  even  more  for  the  blood  of  Horace  Greeley  than  for 
that  of  the  innocent  negroes. 

Though  Mr.  Greeley  was  certainly  in  more  danger  than  any 
white  man  in  the  city,  whether  of  high  or  low  degree,  there 
was  not,  perhaps,  in  all  the  metropolis,  a  single  individual 
who  manifested  more  coolness  than  he.  He  related  in  The 
Tribune,  not  long  afterwards,  what  occurred  as  to  himself  in 
these  words: 

On  the  13th  of  July,  1863  (the  first  day  of  the  Draft  Riota  in  our  city), 
the  editor  of  The  Tribune  was  visited  in  his  office  about  midday  by  a 
devoted  friend,  who  urged  and  entreated  him  to  accompany  the  said  friend 
to  his  home,  a  few  miles  distant.  That  friend  assured  him  that  he  knew 
that  the  life  of  said  editor  was  to  be  taken  forthwith — that  it  had  been 
plotted  and  settled  that  he  should  be  an  early  and  certain  victim  of  the 
ruffian  mob  then  howling  about  The  Tribune  office,  and  inciting  each 
other  to  the  assault,  which  they  actually  made  at  dusk  that  night,  when 
they  smashed  the  windows,  furniture,  etc.,  and  set  fire  to  the  building,  but 
were  promptly  routed  and  expelled  by  the  police.  Riot,  arson,  and  pillage 
were  then  rife  in  different  sections  of  our  city,  of  which  the  rebel  mob 
appeared  to  have  undisputed  possession.  The  editor  (who  writes  this) 
informed  his  friend  that  nothing  would  induce  him  to  leave  the  city — 


THE  ANTI-DRAFT   RIOT.  4:11 

fhat  he  was  where  he  had  a  right  to  be,  and  where  he  should  remain.  That 
friend,  after  exhausting  remonstrance  and  entreaty,  left  him  to  his  fate, 
not  expecting  to  see  him  again.  About  five  p.  M.  of  that  day,  the  editor, 
having  finished  his  work  at  the  office,  went  over  to  Windust's  eating-house 
for  his  dinner,  passing  through  the  howling  mob  for  nearly  the  entire 
distance,  and  recognized  by  several  of  them.  Two  friends  accompanied 
him,  but  not  at  his  invitation  or  suggestion.  Neither  of  the  three  was 
armed.  At  Windust's  dinner  was  ordered  and  eaten  exactly  as  on  other 
days,  but  in  the  largest  room  in  the  house,  without  a  shadow  of  conceal- 
ment or  hiding  of  any  kind.  Dinner  finished,  the  editor  took  a  carriage 
and  drove  to  his  lodging,  where  he  resumed  writing  for  The  Tribune,  and 
continued  it  through  the  evening,  sending  down  his  copy  to  the  office,  and 
being  visited  thence  by  friends  who  informed  him  of  the  mob's  assault, 
and  the  narrow  escape  of  the  building  and  contents  from  destruction. 
Remaining  all  night  at  his  lodging,  he  returned  next  morning  to  the  office 
(now  being  armed),  saw  from  a  window  the  mob  howling  in  its  front, 
hastily  repair  to  the  City  Hall  Park,  there  to  listen  to  a  harangue  from 
•  Horatio  Seymour,  and  remained  there  nearly  to  the  close  of  the  day 
(Tuesday),  when  he  was  finally  induced  to  leave  by  the  representation  of 
the  good  and  true  soldier  who  commanded  it  as  fortress,  that  he  would 
prefer  that  the  mob  should  not  be  provided  with  the  extra  inducement  for 
assault  which  the  known  presence  of  Mr.  Greeley  in  the  building  would 
afford.  He  returned  to  the  office  the  next  morning,  though  the  first  hack- 
man  to  whom  he  applied  refused  to  let  him  enter  his  carriage ;  and  he  was 
in  the  office  nearly  throughout  each  day  of  that  memorable  week  up  to 
Friday  evening,  when  he  (as  usual)  took  the  Harlem  cars  for  his  home  at 
Chappaqua,  where  he  spent  the  Saturday,  as  he  has  done  nearly  every 
Saturday,  save  in  winter,  for  the  last  fifteen  years. 

In  an  article  upon  Horace  Greeley,  in  Harper's  Monthly 
Magazine  for  April,  1873,  Mr.  Junius  Henri  Browne,  speaking 
of  Mr.  Greeley's  courage  during  this  trying  week,  says: 

After  the  riot  had  gotten  well  under  way  he  had  very  little  doubt  he 
would  be  hanged  to  a  lamp-post  by  the  brutal  and  infuriated  mob,  and 
he  had  actually  accepted  death  as  his  inevitable  portion.  Messenger  after 
messenger,  friend  after  friend,  went  to  him  to  apprise  him  of  his  imminent 
peril,  and  were  surprised  to  find  him  as  cool  as  the  summit  of  Mont  Blanc. 
He  had  entire  confidence  in  their  statements,  remarking,  "  Well,  it  doesn't 
make  much  difference.  I've  done  my  work.  I  may  as  well  be  killed  by 
the  mob  as  die  in  my  bed.  Between  now  and  next  time  is  only  a  little 
while." 

The  day  it  was  expected  The  Tribune  would  be  attacked,  its  employes, 
who  had  prepared  for  a  desperate  defense,  spent  several  hours  in  trying  to 
get  him  out  of  the  office.  His  invariable  reply  was,  "  Never  mind  int', 
boys;  I'll  take  care  of  myself."  And  amidst  the  distribution  of  revolvers, 
muskets,  and  hand-grenades,  and  the  fitting  of  hose  to  the  steam-pipcs, 


412  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GKEELET. 

the  intrepid  Horace  sat  down  to  his  desk  to  write  editorials  for  the  next 
morning's  issue.  It  was  only  after  several  of  the  staff  went  to  him,  and 
urged  him  to  quit  the  establishment  for  their  sake,  saying  his  remaining 
would  do  no  good  and  merely  imperil  the  office,  that  he  consented  to 
leave.  He  would  do  for  The  Tribune,  the  darling  of  his  heart,  what  ha 
would  not  do  for  himself.  His  final  remonstrance  was,  "  You  might  as 
well  let  me  stay.  If  there's  going  to  be  any  fun,  I  don't  know  why  1 
shouldn't  see  it  too."  But  at  last  he  was  borne  almost  bodily  into  a  car- 
riage and  driven  off,  still  protesting  against  the  proceeding  as  "  devilish 
mean." 

It  was  characteristic  of  Mr.  Greeley  that  he  should  be  a  non-combatant 
physically  and  a  thorough  gladiator  intellectually.  As  his  biographer 
has  told  us,  he  would  not,  when  a  boy,  fight  back ;  but  he  would  not  run 
under  any  circumstances.  If  attacked,  he  would  stand  and  take  it.  The 
child  was  father  to  the  man.  While  the  mob  threatened  to  demolish  The 
Tribune  office,  its  chief,  though  not  desirous  of  resisting,  was  bent  upon 
staying  by  and  meeting  the  worst. 

The  Union  having  been  able,  through  the  endurance  and 
gallantry  of  its  armed  defenders  and  the  gracious  favour  of 
Almighty  God,  to  repel  the  desperate  assaults  of  the  insurrec- 
tionists consequent  upon  Emancipation,  the  people  again  began 
to  resume  some  of  their  wonted  habits.  It  was  soon  apparent 
that  President  Lincoln  would  be  renominated  and,  being 
renominated,  would  also  be  reelected.  It  was  also  well  known 
to  those  acquainted  with  the  opinions  of  Democratic  politi- 
cians that  General  George  B.  McClellan  would  be  the  candidate 
of  the  Democrats. 

Meantime,  no  little  difference  of  opinion  had  grown  up 
among  the  friends  of  the  Union  who  had  originally  sustained 
Mr.  Lincoln,  which  threatened  to  dismember  the  party  in 
power.  Seldom  if  ever  in  the  whole  history  of  the  world  has 
a  statesman  been  placed  in  a  more  difficult  position,  one  encom- 
passed by  such  great,  constant,  and  various  perils,  as  President 
Lincoln.  It  might  seem  that  he  had  enough  to  engage  all  the 
time  and  thought  of  one  man,  occupying  the  chief  executive 
office,  in  the  formidable  rebellion  which  defiantly  confronted 
the  government.  It  might  appear  that  he  also  had  enough 
thus  to  occupy  time  and  mind  in  the  management  of  that 
singular  obstruction  to  a  vigorous  prosecution  of  the  war 
which  at  the  time  generally  passed  by  the  name  of  the  Border- 
State  policy,  and  in  the  nomenclature  of  wits  as  the  water- 


MK.  LINCOLN'S  RENOMINATION.  413 

gruel  policy.  But  in  addition  to  these  appalling  difficulties 
by  which  he  was  surrounded,  there  were  others  even  more 
annoying  if  not  so  great.  In  respect  to  the  mode  of  conduct- 
ing the  war,  his  own  party  was  divided,  and  this  not  only  in 
general,  but  in  detail.  Many  opposed  the  Border-State  policy; 
many  denounced  the  retention  of  prominent  generals  in  im- 
portant commands;  many  criticised  the  orders  of  different 
generals;  many  demanded  the  removal  of  certain  Cabinet 
officers,  and  the  reinstatement  of  certain  military  officers. 
Many  of  the  ablest  men  of  the  Republican  party  were  in  undis- 
guised hostility  to  the  President,  and  some  who  had  great 
influence  with  him  were  his  secret  enemies.  There  were  but 
few,  it  was  claimed,  who  were  not  alarmed  lest  the  Union 
cause  should  be  ruined  through  deference  to  the  opinions  of 
those  whose  opinions  were  entitled  to  the  least  consideration. 
These  seemed  to  be  always  welcome  to  the  Executive  Mansion. 
The  Radicals  were  allowed  to  dance  attendance  on  the  clerks 
and  messengers  in  the  ante-rooms. 

"When  the  National  Convention  of  the  Republicans  assembled 
at  Baltimore,  in  1864,  Mr.  Lincoln  was  renominated  almost  with 
unanimity.  Missouri  alone  voted  against  him.  And  yet  it 
may  well  be  doubted  whether  one  in  ten  of  the  earnest  men  in 
Congress  was  of  this  way  of  thinking.  President  Lincoln  was 
extremely  distasteful  to  a  large  majority  of  Congress,  not  only, 
but  to  many  of  the  most  prominent  Republicans  of  the  country. 
Among  those  who  opposed  his  renomination  was  Horace 
Greeley.  He  was  herein  in  a  very  much  larger  party  than  is 
commonly  supposed;  but  others,  after  renomination  and 
reelection,  covered  up  their  previous  records.  Mr.  Greeley 
published  his  to  the  world.  If  the  inside  political  history  of 
the  war  shall  ever  be  written,  it  will  make  many  revelations 
of  a  remarkable  and  exciting  nature.  It  will  be  found,  among 
other  things,  that  Horace  Greeley,  in  his  opposition  to  Mr. 
Lincoln,  had  the  hearty  endorsement  of  very  many  representa- 
tive men  of  whom  to  this  day  it  is  not  generally  known  that 
they  were  in  the  habit,  in  private,  of  denouncing  President 
Lincoln's  administration  with  scarcely  less  vehemence  thau 
they  had  denounced  that  of  Mr.  Buchanan. 


414  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GKEELEY. 

The  opposition  of  which  I  now  speak  was  of  men  eminent 
for  abilities,  and  sprang  from  an  intense  patriotism.  They 
did  not  fear  that  the  President's  ultimate  conclusions  would 
be  unwise,  but  that  the  country  might  be  ruined  before,  in  his 
imperturbable  deliberation,  he  should  reach  conclusions;  that 
the  Union  cause  might  be  lost  while  he  was  making  up  his 
mind  upon  the  ways  and  means  best  to  preserve  it.  The  ways 
and  means  he  finally  selected  were  those  they  had  advocated ; 
and  while  it  seems  probable  the  war  might  sooner  have  ended 
had  he  adopted  them  sooner,  it  is  not  impossible  they  would 
have  been  followed  by  temporary  disaster,  as  was  the  case  with 
emancipation.  We  can  now  clearly  enough  see  that  they  were 
in  the  right  in  judgment,  and  that  President  Lincoln  heartily 
agreed  with  them,  differing  from  them  only  as  to  the  best  time 
when  certain  things  should  be  done. 

The  Democratic  party  knew  perfectly  well  that  there  was 
division  of  counsel  among  the  Republicans.  This  was  mani- 
fested in  a  variety  of  ways,  notably  by  a  convention  of  Radicals 
at  Cleveland,  Ohio,  which,  in  the  latter  part  of  May,  1864, 
nominated  General  Fremont  for  the  Presidency,  and  General 
John  Cochrane  for  the  Vice-Presidency,  and  later,  by  a  political 
manifesto  from  Senator  Wade,  of  Ohio,  and  Representative 
Henry  Winter  Davis,  of  Maryland,  in  which  the  administration 
was  severely  criticised.  Mr.  Greeley  heartily  assented  to  many 
considerations  urged  by  Messrs.  Wade  and  Davis,  but  was  glad 
that  President  Lincoln  had  not  approved  the  reconstruction 
bill,  the  defeat  of  which  was  the  basis  of  those  gentlemen's 
animadversions.  Henry  Winter  Davis  was  one  of  our  most 
eloquent  orators.  He  was  also  a  strong  and  polished  writer. 
This  document  from  his  pen  made  a  bill  of  indictment  which 
it  was  extremely  difficult  to  answer. 

The  Democracy  failed  to  avail  themselves  of  the  divisions 
among  their  opponents.  In  their  National  Convention,  held 
at  Chicago,  General  George  B.  McClellan  was  nominated  for 
President.  It  has  been  America's  unfortunate  lot  to  have  pro- 
duced many  men  who  have  had  greatness  thrust  upon  them. 
Of  all  these  General  McClellan  is  the  most  conspicuous  example 
of  deplorable  inability  to  carry  the  responsibilities  and  perform 


GENERAL  MC  CLELLAN.  415 

the  duties  of  exalted  station.  Of  amiable  dispositions  and, 
doubtless,  of  patriotic  impulses,  lie  was  by  nature  wholly  unfit 
for  the  conduct  of  great  affairs  whether  civil  or  military.  A 
formidable  movement  or  a  great  idea  "stampeded"  him.  As 
a  soldier  he  was  masterly  only  in  retreat.  No  illustrious 
captain  of  any  age  ever  got  a  superior  army  out  of  the  way  of 
an  inferior  one  with  so  much  skill  and  eclat.  His  generals 
and  his  magnificent  army  won  some  victories  in  spite  of  him 
of  which  he  declined  to  take  the  least  advantage.  In  political 
affairs  he  was  the  merest  tyro.  One  of  the  most  melancholy 
mistakes  with  which  history  will  charge  President  Lincoln's 
conduct  of  the  war  will  be  his  retaining  this  excellent  gentle- 
man in  a  military  position  which  he  was  incompetent  to  fill. 

The  political  campaign  of  the  year  1864  was  one  of  earnest- 
ness on  the  part  of  the  Republicans,  but  was  not  characterized 
by  even  the  usual  outward  manifestations  of  excitement.  In 
the  midst  of  a  terrible  war,  by  which  the  South  was  being 
devastated,  and  the  North  in  nearly  every  household  mourning 
the  long  absence  or,  may  be,  the  death  of  a  citizen  soldier,  it 
had  been  unbecoming  had  the  ordinary  tricks,  parades,  and 
effervescence  of  partizan  politics  prevailed. 

A  notable  event  of  the  campaign  was  the  resignation  of  Mr. 
Montgomery  Blair  as  a  member  of  President  Lincoln's  cabinet. 
Mr.  Blair  had  been  Postmaster  General  since  the  beginning  of 
Mr.  Lincoln's  administration.  The  son  of  a  distinguished 
politician,  the  brother  of  another,  he  was  himself  but  little 
known  to  the  country  when  President  Lincoln  called  him  to  the 
cabinet.  He  performed  his  official  duties  with  energy  and 
ability,  but  through  certain  disputes  and  quarrels  growing  out 
of  General  Fremont's  operations  in  Missouri,  in  the  early  part 
of  the  war,  and,  perhaps,  through  other  causes  also,  Mr.  Blair 
had  become  extremely  unpopular  with  the  Radical  wing  of  the 
Republican  party.  He  was  regarded  as  the  marplot  of  the 
administration.  It  seemed  to  be  necessary,  certainly  highly 
desirable,  that  there  should  be  but  one  candidate  against  Gen- 
eral McClellan.  President  Lincoln,  under  these  circumstances, 
felt  justifiable  in  requesting  Mr.  Blair  to  withdraw  from  his 
cabinet.  The  request  being  instantly  complied  with,  the  with- 


416  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GEKELEY. 

drawal  of  General  Fremont  as  a  Presidential  candidate  speedily 
followed.  In  political  logic,  one  withdrawal  was  the  result  of 
the  other. 

A  matter  of  more  importance  in  respect  to  the  war  generally 
than  to  the  political  campaign,  was  an  attempt  by  Mr.  Greeley 
to  bring  authorized  parties  together  with  the  object  of  con- 
cluding the  war  by  negotiation.  This  he  undertook  even  so 
early  as  January,  1863,  but  after  weeks  of  endeavour  had  to  give 
it  up,  "without  having  come  in  sight  of  any  rebel  proposition 
at  all."  In  July,  1864,  he  received  a  letter  from  W.  C.  Jewett, 
urging  further  efforts  in  this  behalf,  and,  unwilling  to  leave 
anything  undone  that  might  honourably  be  done  in  the  interest 
of  peace,  he  enclosed  Mr.  Jewett's  letter  to  President  Lincoln, 
with  one  of  his  own,  as  follows: 

t  NEW- YORK,  July  7, 1864. 

MY  DEAR  SIR:  —  I  venture  to  enclose  you  a  letter  and  telegraphic  dis- 
patch that  I  received  yesterday  from  our  irrepressible  friend,  Colorado 
Jewett,  at  Niagara  Falls.  I  think  they  deserve  attention.  Of  course,  I  do 
not  indorse  Jewett's  positive  averment  that  his  friends  at  the  Falls  have 
"full  powers"  from  Jefferson  Davis,  though  I  do  not  doubt  that  he  thinks 
they  have.  I  let  that  statement  stand  as  simply  evidencing  the  anxiety 
of  the  Confederates  everywhere  for  peace.  So  much  is  beyond  doubt. 

And,  therefore,  I  venture  to  remind  you  that  our  bleeding,  bankrupt, 
almost  dying  country  also  longs  for  peace, — shudders  at  the  prospect  of 
fresh  conscriptions,  of  further  wholesale  devastations,  and  of  new  rivers 
of  blood ;  and  a  wide-spread  conviction  that  the  government  and  its  promi- 
ment  supporters  are  not  anxious  for  peace,  and  do  not  improve  proffered 
opportunities  to  achieve  it,  is  doing  great  harm  now,  and  is  morally  certain, 
unless  removed,  to  do  far  greater  in  the  approaching  elections. 

It  is  not  enough  that  we  anxiously  desire  a  true  and  lasting  peace ;  we 
ought  to  demonstrate  and  establish  the  truth  beyond  cavil.  The  fact  that 
A.  II.  Stephens  was  not  permitted  a  year  ago  to  visit  and  confer  with  the 
authorities  at  Washington  has  done  harm,  which  the  tone  of  the  late 
National  Convention  at  Baltimore  is  not  calculated  to  counteract. 

I  entreat  you,  in  your  own  time  and  manner,  to  submit  overtures  for 
pacification  to  the  Southern  insurgents,  which  the  impartial  must  pro- 
nounce frank  and  generous.  If  only  with  a  view  to  the  momentous  elec- 
tion soon  to  occur  in  North  Carolina,  and  of  the  draft  to  be  enforced  in 
the  Free  States,  this  should  be  done  at  once.  I  would  give  the  safe-con- 
duct required  by  the  Rebel  envoys  at  Niagara,  upon  their  parole  to  avoid 
observation,  and  to  refrain  from  all  communication  with  their  sympathi- 
zers in  the  loyal  States;  but  you  may  see  reasons  for  declining  it.  But 
whether  through  them  or  otherwise,  do  not,  I  entreat  you,  fail  to  make  the 


PEACE   NEGOTIATIONS.  417 

Southern  people  comprehend  that  you,  and  all  of  us,  are  anxious  for  peace, 
and  prepared  to  grant  liberal  terms.    I  venture  to  suggest  the  following 

PLAN  OF  ADJUSTMENT. 

1.  The  Union  Is  restored  and  declared  perpetual. 

2.  Slavery  is  utterly  and  forever  abolished  throughout  the  same. 

8.  A  complete  amnesty  for  all  political  ofl'enses,  with  a  restoration  of  all  the  Inhabi- 
tants of  each  State  to  all  the  privileges  of  citizens  of  the  United  States. 

4.  The  Union  to  pay  four  hundred  million  dollars  ($400,000,000)  in  flve-per-cent  United 
States  stock,  to  the  late  Slave  States,  loyal  and  secession  alike,  to  be  apportioned  pro 
raia,  according  to  their  population  respectively,  by  the  census  of  1860,  in  compensation 
for  the  losses  of  their  loyal  citizens  by  the  abolition  of  slavery.    Each  State  to  be  entitled 
to  its  quota  upon  the  ratification  by  its  legislature  of  this  adjustment.    The  bonds  to  he 
at  the  absolute  disposal  of  the  legislature  aforesaid. 

5.  The  said  Slave  States  to  be  entitled  henceforth  to  representation  in  the  House  on 
the  basis  of  their  total,  instead  of  their  Federal  population,  the  whole  now  being  free. 

6.  A  national  convention  to  be  assembled  as  soon  as  may  be,  to  ratify  this  adjustment, 
and  make  such  changes  in  the  Constitution  as  may  be  deemed  advisable. 

Mr.  President,  I  fear  you  do  not  realize  how  intently  the  people  desire 
any  peace  consistent  with  the  national  integrity  and  honour,  and  how  joy- 
ously they  would  hail  its  achievement,  and  bless  its  authors.  With  United 
States  stocks  worth  but  forty  cents  in  gold  per  dollar,  and  drafting  about  to 
commence  on  the  third  million  of  Union  soldiers,  can  this  be  wondered  at? 

I  do  not  say  that  a  just  peace  is  now  attainable,  though  I  believe  it  to 
be  so.  But  I  do  say  that  a  frank  offer  by  you  to  the  insurgents,  of  terms 
•which  the  impartial  would  say  ought  to  be  accepted,  will,  at  the  worst, 
prove  an  immense  and  sorely  needed  advantage  to  the  national  cause.  It 
may  save  us  from  a  Northern  insurrection. 

Yours  truly,  HORACE  GREELEY. 

HON.  A.  LINCOLN,  President,  Washington,  D.  C. 

P.  S. — Even  though  it  should  be  deemed  unadvisible  to  make  an  offer 
of  terms  to  the  Rebels,  I  insist  that,  in  any  possible  case,  it  is  desirable 
that  any  offer  they  may  be  disposed  to  make  should  be  received,  and  either 
accepted  or  rejected.  I  beg  you  to  invite  those  now  at  Niagara  to  exhibit 
their  credentials  and  submit  their  ultimatum.  H.  G. 

Upon  the  receipt  of  this  letter,  President  Lincoln  authorized 
Mr.  Greeley  to  repair  to  Niagara  Falls  and  converse  with  the 
gentlemen  said  to  have  authority  to  treat.  These  "  rebel 
negotiators  "  were  supposed  by  Mr.  Greeley  to  be  Messrs. 
Clement  C.  Clay,  Jr.,  of  Alabama,  Jacob  Thompson,  of  Missis- 
sippi, James  P.  Holcombe,  of  Virginia,  with  Mr.  George  ~N. 
Sanders  attached.  Mr.  Thompson,  however,  did  not  appear. 
Messrs.  Clay  and  Holcombe,  in  acknowledging  a  note  from 
Mr.  Greeley  to  them  as  ambassadors  with  full  powers,  and  as 
such  offering  them  safa-conduct  to  Washington,  corrected  that 
27 


418  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELET. 

opinion,  stating  that  they  had  not  been  accredited  as  tlie  bear- 
ers of  propositions  looking  to  the  establishment  of  peace. 
Whereupon,  Mr.  Greeley  telegraphed  to  Washington  for  fur- 
ther instructions.     In  response  the  President  sent  the  follow 
ing  by  the  hands  of  Major  Hay  : 

ExEctmvE  MANSION,  WASHINGTON,  D.  0.,  July  18, 1864. 
To  whom  it  may  concern: — 

Any  proposition  which  embraces  the  restoration  of  peace,  the  integrity 
of  the  whole  Union,  and  the  abandonment  of  slavery,  and  which  conies  by 
and  with  an  authority  that  can  control  the  armies  now  at  war  against  the 
United  States,  will  be  received  and  considered  by  the  Executive  Govern- 
ment of  the  United  States,  and  will  be  met  by  liberal  terms,  on  other  sub- 
stantial and  collateral  points,  and  the  bearef  or  bearers  thereof  shaH  have 
safe-conduct  both  ways. 

ABKAHAM  LINCOLN. 

Messrs.  Ilolcombe  and  Clay  declined  the  safe-conduct  thus 
offered,  and  in  a  long  note  to  Mr.  Greeley  undertook  to  show 
that  President  Lincoln's  proposition  was  insulting  to  the 
South  and  could  not  be  entertained.  They  undertook  again, 
to  "  fire  the  Southern  heart,"  but  did  not  meet  with  notable 
success. 

Mr.  Greeley  had  no  authority  to  negotiate,  and  did  not 
undertake  anything  of  the  kind.  He  endeavoured  to  bring 
peace-makers  together.  In  this  he  failed,  but  the  result  of  his 
effort  was  strong  proof  of  the  fact  that  the  rebel  authorities 
would  not  treat  except  upon  condition  of  separation.  And 
this  was  beneficial  to  the  Union  cause  throughout  the  North, 
whilst  the  President's  proposition  greatly  cheered  the  friends 
of  free  and  united  America  in  Europe.  It  is  to  be  observed, 
however,  that  Mr.  Greeley 's  proposed  "  plan  of  adjustment  " 
as  set  forth  in  his  letter  to  The  President  would  have  saved 
the  nation  immensely  in  treasure  and  life,  without  losing  a 
single  benefit  that  came  from  a  further  prosecution  of  the  war. 
But  had  the  government  submitted  this  plan,  it  would,  doubt- 
less, have  been  rejected  no  less  cavalierly  than  any  other  which 
did  not  recognize  the  confederate  government 

So  the  war  went  on.  The  campaigns  of  Generals  Grant  and 
Sherman,  that  of  the  former  in  Virginia,  that  of  the  latter  in 
Georgia,  were  conducted  with  great  vigour.  General  Grant, 


GENERAL  GRANT.  419 

tip  to  the  early  part  of  1864,  had  all  the  time  been  in  command 
in  the  West,  and  South.  Early  in  1862,  he  had  forced  the 
unconditional  surrender  of  Fort  Donelson.  The  surprise  of 
Shiloh  followed,  but  he  turned  defeat  into  victory,  of  which 
greater  advantage  would  have  been  taken,  there  is  little  doubt, 
but  for  the  caution  of  General  Halleck,  who  soon  assumed 
command.  The  campaigns  of  Vicksburgh  and  of  Chattanooga 
were  of  inestimable  value  to  the  Union  cause*  Thus  was  the 
great  valley  of  the  Mississippi  restored  to  the  control  of  the 
Union  government.  At  Chattanooga,  the  back-bone  of  the 
rebellion  was  broken.  Thereafter,  the  Cause  of  the  Confed- 
eracy was  hopeless. 

General  Grant,  being  transferred  to  the  East,  took  command 
of  the  armies  operating  against  Richmond.  General  Sherman 
had  command  of  the  principal  armies  in  the  South.  It  is  the 
opinion  of  the  best  military  critics  that  General  Sherman's 
operations  in  Georgia  manifested  the  greater  military  genius 
and  those  of  Grant  against  the  forces  defending  Richmond  the 
sublimef  pluck  and  fortitude.  Sherman  marched  to  victory; 
Grant  fought  hig  way  to  it.  Sherman  seemed  to  place  his 
chief  reliance  in  his  soldiers'  legs ;  Grant,  on  his  soldiers'  lives. 
Grant  could  not  have  conducted  the  campaign  of  Atlanta,  nor 
Sherman  that  of  Richmond.  Those  who  have  charged  General 
Grant  with  a  needless  slaughter  of  troops  in  his  operations  for 
the  capture  of  Richmond  may  be  in  the  right,  but,  if  so,  it  is 
because  the  capture  of  the  rebel  capital  was  not  worth  the  sac- 
rifice. That  was  the  work  he  was  given  to  do,  and  it  could 
only  be  done,  after  McClellan  and  Halleck,  through  "  red  fields 
of  blood. "  Of  all  our  generals,  Grant  alone,  perhaps,  had  the 
nerve  to  assume  the  dread  responsibility  and  execute  the  fearful 
task  imposed  upon  him;  much  more  fearful  than  it  need  have 
been,  but  not  through  fault  of  his.  In  1862,  he  would  have 
lost  no  more  lives  than  McClellan  lost;  and  he  would  have 
taken  Richmond. 

The  stubborn,  relentless  warfare  of  Grant,  the  brilliant  suc- 
cesses of  Sherman,  gave  great  encouragement  to  the  Unionists. 
Canby  and  Farragut  also  had  heroic  success  in  Mobile  Bay 
and  then,  what  with  General  Thomas's  magnificent  victory  of 


420  LIFE   OF  HORACE   GKEELEY. 

Nashville,  Sherman  "slashing  through  the  Carolinas,"  after 
his  remarkable  march  to  the  sea,  General  Wilson's  great  cav- 
alry operations,  and  Grant's  final  movements  against  Richmond, 
the  triumph  of  the  Union  was  made  complete.  It  was  most 
fitting  that  the  capitulation  of  one  great  rebel  army  should  be 
made  to  Grant,  the  other  to  Sherman.  After  this,  all  that  was 
left  of  the  dreadful  war,  was  like  the  small  pattering  of  rain 
which  succeeds  the  bursting  of  the  thunder-cloud. 

Then  followed  the  warm,  bright  sunshine  of  national  rejoic- 
ing. The  jubilation  throughout  the  North  was  universal, 
clearly  demonstrating  that  Mr.  Greeley  had  been  right,  in  his 
letter  to  President  Lincoln  above  quoted  when  he  said  with  so 
much  emphasis  that  the  country  longed  for  peace.  In  the 
midst  of  the  rejoicings,  however,  the  President  wa*s  assassinated. 
This  most  horrid  crime  plunged  the  public  from  the  height  of 
joy  to  the  deepest  sorrow.  It  was  impossible  that  the  murder 
of  so  good  a  man  at  any  time  should  not  have  aroused  pro- 
found griet  and  indignation.  Taking  place  as  it  did  in  the 
midst  of  national  gratulations  upon  the  return  of  peace,  it  is 
not  surprising  that  it  was  followed  by  proceedings  of  an  irreg- 
ular, unlawful,  dangerous,  and  scandalous  character.  The  great 
reaction  destroyed  the  presence  of  mind  of  government  and 
people. 

Certainly  nothing  in  our  history  ever  so  greatly  called  forth 
the  sorrow  of  the  people.  At  the  Capital,  there  was  universal 
manifestation  of  mourning.  "Within  a  few  minutes  after  the 
announcement  of  death,  hundreds  of  buildings  were  draped 
with  black.  Soon,  nearly  every  house  was  placed  in  mourning. 
The  supply  of  goods  of  this  kind  was  completely  exhausted. 
But  perhaps  the  most  touching  manifestation  of  grief  was  on 
the  part  of  the  poor  negroes.  They  knew  not  where  to  find 
comfort.  Thousands  of  them  lifted  up  their  voices  and  wept 
as  they  walked  along  the  public  streets.  The  whole  nation  was 
cast  down  in  sorrow;  and  if  there  was  a  feeling  of  revenge 
mingling  with  the  finer  sentiment,  the  nature  of  the  good 
President's  taking  off  will  fully  explain  it. 

Of  Abraham  Lincoln,  Horace  Greeley  deliberately  wrote: 


PRESIDENT   LINCOLN.  421 

There  are  those  who  say  that  Mr.  Lincoln  was  fortunate  in  his  death  as 
in  his  life;  I  judge  otherwise.  I  hold  him  most  inapt  for  the  leadership 
of  a  people  involved  in  desperate.,  agonizing  war;  while  I  deem  few  men 
better  fitted  to  guide  a  nation's  destinies  in  time  of  peace.  Especially  do 
I  deem  him  eminently  fitted  to  soothe,  to  heal,  and  to  re-unite  in  bonds  of 
true,  fraternal  affection  a  people  just  lapsing  into  peace  after  years  of  dig- 
trading  desolating  internal  strife.  His  true  career  was  just  opening  when 
an  assassin's  bullet  quenched  his  light  of  life. 

Mr.  Lincoln  entered  Washington  the  victim  of  a  grave  delusion.  A 
genial,  quiet,  essentially  peaceful  man,  trained  in  the  ways  of  the  bar  and 
the  stump,  he  fully  believed  that  there  would  be  no  civil  war, — no  serious 
effort  to  consummate  Disunion.  His  faith  in  Reason  as  a  moral  force  was 
so  implicit  that  he  did  not  cherish  a  doubt  that  his  Inaugural  Address, 
whereon  he  had  bestowed  much  thought  and  labour,  would,  when  read 
throughout  the  South,  dissolve  the  Confederacy  as  frost  is  dissipated  by  a 
vernal  sun.  I  sat  just  behind  him  as  he  read  it,  on  a  bright,  warm,  still 
March  day,  expecting  to  hear  its  delivery  arrested  by  the  crack  of  a  rifle 
aimed  at  his  heart;  but  it  pleased  God  to  postpone  the  deed,  though  there 
was  forty  times  the  reason  for  shooting  him  in  1860  that  there  was  in  '65, 
and  at  least  forty  times  as  many  intent  on  killing  or  having  him  killed. 
No  shot  was  then  fired,  however ;  for  his  hour  had  not  yet  come. 

******  * 

When  we  were  at  length  unmistakably  launched  on  the  stormy  ocean  of 
civil  war,  Mr.  Lincoln's  tenacity  of  purpose  paralleled  his  former  immo- 
bility. I  believe  he  would  have  been  nearly  the  last,  if  not  the  very  last, 
man  in  America  to  recognize  the  Southern  Confederacy,  had  its  arms  been 
triumphant.  He  would  have  much  preferred  death. 

This  firmness  impelled  him  to  what  seemed  to  me  a  grave  error.  Because 
he  would  never  consent  to  give  up  the  Union,  he  dreaded  to  recognize  in 
any  manner  the  existence  of  the  Confederacy.  Yet  such  recognition,  after 
the  capture  of  several  thousand  of  our  soldiers,  became  inevitable.  Had 
fortune  uniformly  smiled  on  our  arms,  we  might  have  treated  the  Rebel- 
lion as  a  seditious  riot ;  but  our  serious  loss  in  prisoners  at  Bull  Run 
rendered  this  thenceforth  impossible.  We  were  virtually  compelled  to 
recognize  the  Confederates  as  belligerents,  by  negotiating  an  exchange  of 
prisoners.  Thenceforth  (it  seems  to  me)  we  were  precluded  from  treating 
them  as  felons.  And  I  could  see  no  objection,  not  merely  to  receiving  with 
courtesy  any  overtures  for  peace  they  might  see  fit  to  make,  but  even  to 
making  overtures  to  them,  as  Gfreat  Britain  so  publicly  did  to  our  Revolu- 
tionary fathers  in  the  Summer  of  '76. 

War  has  become  so  fearfully  expensive,  through  the  progress  of  invention 
and  machinery,  that  to  protract  it  is  to  involve  all  parties  in  bankruptcy 
and  ruin.  Belligerents  are,  therefore,  prone  to  protest  their  anxiety  for 
Peace,  —  in  most  cases,  sincerely.  Napoleon,  though  often  at  war,  was 
always  proclaiming  his  anxiety  for  peace.  It  seemed  to  me,  throughout 
our  great  struggle,  that  a  more  vigorous  prosecution,  alike  of  War  and 
of  Peace  was  desirable.  Larger  armies,  in  the  average  more  energetically 


LIFE   OF  HORACE   GKEELET. 

led,  more  ably  handled,  seemed  to  be  the  National  need,  down  to  a  lat« 
stage  of  the  contest.  And  I  deemed  it  a  mistake  to  put  aside  any  overture 
that  looked  to  the  achievement  of  peace.  Instead  of  repelling  such  over- 
tures, however  unpromising,  I  would  have  openly  welcomed  any  and  all, 
and  so  treated  each  as  to  prove  that  the  continuance  of  war  was  not  the 
fault  of  our  side.  And  so,  when  Henry  May,  Col.  Jacquess,  and  others, 
solicited  permission  to  go  to  Richmond  in  quest  of  Peace,  I  would  have 
openly  granted  them  every  facility,  asking  them  only  to  state  distinctly 
that  I  had  not  sent  nor  accredited  them.  And  I  judge  that  Mr.  Lincoln 
slowly  came  to  a  conclusion  not  dissimilar  to  mine,  since  Mr.  F.  P.  Blair'a 
two  visits  to  Richmond  were  made  with  his  full  knowledge ;  while  his  own 
visit  to  Fortress  Monroe,  there  to  meet  Confederate  Commissioners  and 
discuss  with  them  terms  of  pacification,  was  a  formal  notice  to  all  con- 
cerned of  his  anxiety  to  stay  the  effusion  of  blood.  I  believe  that  this 
conference  did  much  to  precipitate  the  downfall  of  the  tottering  Confed- 
eracy. I  doubt  whether  any  one  of  Sherman's  nearly  simultaneous 
successes  did  more.  And,  while  Mr.  Lincoln  would  have  been  a  tenacious 
champion  of  the  authority  and  dignity  of  the  Union  and  the  rights  and 
security  of  all  its  loyal  people,  I  am  sure  the  vanquished  Rebels  would 
have  found  him  a  generous  conqueror. 

Mr.  Lincoln  died  for  his  country  as  truly  as  any  soldier  who  fell  fighting 
in  the  ranks  of  her  armies.  He  was  not  merely  killed  for  her  sake,— 
because  of  the  high  responsibilities  she  had  a  second  time  devolved  on 
him,  and  the  fidelity  wherewith  he  fulfilled  them,  —  he  was  worn  out  in 
her  service,  and  would  not,  I  judge,  have  lived  out  his  official  term,  had 
no  one  sought  his  immolation.  When  I  last  saw  him,  a  few  weeks  before 
his  death,  I  was  struck  by  his  haggard,  care-fraught  face,  so  different  from 
the  sunny,  gladsome  countenance  he  first  brought  from  Illinois.  I  felt 
that  his  life  hung  by  so  slender  a  thread  that  any  new  access  of  trouble 
or  excess  of  effort  might  suddenly  close  his  career.  I  had  ceased  to  appre- 
hend his  assassination,  —  had  ceased  even  to  think  of  it;  yet  "the  sunset 
of  life  "  was  plainly  looking  out  of  his  kindly  eyes  and  gleaming  from  hia 
weather-beaten  visage. 

Mr.  Lincoln  was  emphatically  a  man  of  the  people.  Mr.  Clay  was  called 
"The  Great  Commoner"  by  those  who  admired  and  loved  him;  but  Clay 
was  imperious,  even  haughty,  in  his  moods,  with  aristocratic  tastes  and 
faults,  utterly  foreign  to  Lincoln's  essentially  plebeian  nature.  There 
never  yet  was  man  so  lowly  as  to  feel  humbled  in  the  presence  of  Abra- 
ham Lincoln ;  there  was  no  honest  man  who  feared  or  dreaded  to  meet 
him ;  there  was  no  virtuous  society  so  rude  that,  had  he  casually  dropped 
into  it,  he  would  have  checked  innocent  hilarity  or  been  felt  as  a  damper 
on  enjoyment.  Had  he  entered  as  a  stranger  a  logger's  camp  in  the  great 
woods,  a  pioneer's  bark-covered  cabin  in  some  new  settlement,  he  would 
have  soon  been  recognized  and  valued  as  one  whose  acquaintance  was  to 
be  prized  and  cultivated. 

Mr.  Lincoln  was  essentially  a  growing  man.  Enjoying  no  advantage* 
in  youth,  he  had  observed  and  reflected  much  since  he  attained  to  ma*. 


PRESIDENT  JOHNSON.  428 

hood,  and  he  was  steadily  increasing  his  stock  of  knowledge  to  the  day  of 
his  death.  He  was  a  wiser,  abler  man  when  he  entered  upon  his  second 
than  when  he  commenced  his  first  Presidential  term.  His  mental  pro- 
cesses were  slow,  but  sure ;  if  he  did  not  acquire  swiftly,  he  retained  all 
that  he  had  once  learned.  Greater  men  our  country  has  produced ;  hut 
not  another  whom,  humanly  speaking,  she  could  so  ill  spare,  when  she 
lost  him,  as  the  victim  of  Wilkes  Booth's  murderous  aim. 

Though  I  very  heartily  supported  it  when  made,  I  did  not  favour  his  re- 
nomination  as  President;  for  I  wanted  the  War  driven  onward  with  vehe- 
mence, and  this  was  not  in  his  nature.  Always  dreading  that  the  National 
credit  would  fail,  or  the  National  resolution  falter,  I  feared  that  his  easy 
ways  would  allow  the  Rebellion  to  obtain  European  recognition  and 
achieve  ultimate  success.  But  that  "  Divinity  that  shapes  our  ends  "  waa 
quietly  working  out  for  us  a  larger  and  fuller  deliverance  than  I  had 
dared  to  hope  for,  leaving  to  such  short-sighted  mortals  as  I  no  part  but  to 
wonder  and  adore.  We  have  had  chieftains  who  would  have  crushed  out 
the  Rebellion  in  six  months,  and  restored  "  the  Union  as  it  was  " ;  but  God 
gave  us  the  one  leader  whose  control  secured  not  only  the  downfall  of  th»» 
Rebellion,  but  the  eternal  overthrow  of  Human  Slavery  under  the  flag  of 
the  Great  Republic.1 

The  Convention  which  had  re-nominated  Mr.  Lincoln  for  the 
Presidency,  had  selected  Andrew  Johnson,  of  Tennessee,  as 
candidate  for  Vice-President.  Upon  the  death  of  Mr.  Lincoln, 
Mr.  Johnson  became  President  by  force  of  constitutional  pro- 
vision. The  questions  which  now  arose  for  settlement  by 
statesmanship  were  novel,  difficult,  exciting.  The  reconstruc- 
tion of  States  lately  in  rebellion:  the  rehabilitation  of  th6 
Union:  presented  a  problem  of  the  gravest  practical  import- 
ance and  upon  which,  as  was  natural,  there  was  wide  difference 
of  opinion.  Mr.  Johnson  entered  into  the  office  of  the  Presi- 
dency with  incomparably  more  dignity  than  that  with  which 
he  had  been  inducted  into  the  office  of  the  Vice-Presidency  j 
but  on  either  occasion  his  penchant  for  speechifying  was  gen- 
erously manifested.  Upon  becoming  President,  he  seemed  to 
be  governed  by  an  earnest  desire  to  see  severe  penalties  im- 
posed upon  the  late  rebels  in  arms  and  their  leaders.  In  the 
course  of  a  few  months,  however,  he  fell  into  the  arms  of 
Mosby's  guerrillas,  and  from  that  time  forth  there  was  wide 
difference  between  him  and  most  Republicans.  Mr.  Greeley 
more  than  once  undertook  to  bring  about  reconciliation 

1  Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life,  p.  404  et  $eq. 


424:  JJFK   OF  HORACE  GKEELET. 

between  the  President  and  Congress.     In  September,  1866,  he 
gave  an  account  of  his  efforts  in  this  behalf: 

Soon  after  our  last  State  election,  and  before  the  assembling  of  the  pres- 
ent Congress,  I  went,  not  uninvited,  to  Washington,  expressly  to  guard 
against  such  a  difference.  Being  admitted  to  an  interview  with  the  Presi- 
dent, I  urged  him  to  call  to  Washington  three  of  the  most  eminent  and 
trusted  expositors  of  Northern  anti-slavery  sentiment,  and  three  equally 
eminent  and  representative  Southern  ex-Rebels,  and  ask  them  to  take  up 
their  residence  at  the  White  House  for  a  week,  a  fortnight,  so  long  as  they 
might  find  necessary,  while  they,  by  free  and  friendly  conference  and 
discussion,  should  earnestly  endeavour  to  find  a  common  ground  whereon 
the  North  and  the  South  should  be  not  merely  reconciled,  but  made  ever- 
more fraternal  and  harmonious.  I  suggested  that  the  President  should 
occasionally,  as  he  could  find  time,  drop  in  on  these  conferences,  and  offer 
such  suggestions  as  he  should  deem  fit, — rather  as  a  moderator  or  common 
friend,  than  as  a  party  to  the  discussion. 

A  suggestion  of  names  being  invited,  I  proposed  those  of  Governor 
Andrew  of  Massachusetts,  Gerrit  Smith  of  New  York,  and  Judge  R.  P. 
Spaulding  of  Ohio,  as  three  whp  seemed  to  me  fair  representatives  of  the 
anti-slavery  sentiment  of  the  North,  while  neither  specially  obnoxious  to 
nor  disposed  to  deal  harshly  with,  the  South ;  and  I  added  that  I  hoped 
they  would  be  met  by  men  like  General  Robert  E.  Lee,  Alexander  H. 
Stephens,  etc.,  who  would  be  recognized  and  heeded  by  the  South  as  men 
in  whose  hands  her  honour  and  true  interests  would  be  safe.  But  I  added 
that  I  had  no  special  desire  that  these  or  any  particular  men  should  be 
selected,  wishing  only  that  those  chosen  from  either  section  should  be 
such  as  to  command  their  people's  confidence  and  support.  And  I  pledged 
myself  to  support,  to  the  extent  of  my  power,  any  adjustment  that  should 
thus  be  matured  and  agreed  upon. 

Some  two  months  later,  after  the  meeting  of  Congress,  and  when  the 
political  sky  had  become  darker,  I  went  again  to  Washington,  on  the 
assurance  of  a  mutual  friend  that  the  President  desired  to  see  me.  The 
joint  committee  on  reconstruction  had  then  been  appointed.  At  an  inter- 
view promptly  accorded,  I  urged  the  President  to  invite  this  committee  to 
the  White  House,  and  discuss  with  them,  from  evening  to  evening,  as  friend 
with  friends,  all  the  phases  of  the  grave  problem  of  reconstruction,  with 
a  fixed  resolve  to  find  a  basis  of  agreement  if  possible.  I  urged  such  con- 
siderations  as  occurred  to  me  in  favour  of  the  feasibility  of  such  agree- 
ment, if  it  were  earnestly  sought,  as  I  felt  sure  it  would  be  on  the  side  of 
Congress.  The  vast  patronage  in  the  President's  hands,  the  reluctance  of 
the  majority  in  Congress  to  see  their  friends,  supporters,  and  nominees, 
expelled  by  wholesale  from  office,  and  their  places  supplied  by  bitter  adver- 
saries; the  natural  anxiety  of  every  party  in  power  to  maintain  cordial 
relations  with  the  head  of  the  government  chosen  by  its  votes,  —  these, 
and  a  thousand  kindred  considerations,  rendered  morally  certain  an  agree-* 


RECONSTRUCTION.  425 

ment  between  Congress  and  the  President,  without  a  sacrifice  of  principle 
on  either  hand,  if  the  latter  sould  sincerely  seek  it. 

I  speak  only  of  what  I  said  and  proposed,  because  I  have  no  permission 
and  no  right  to  speak  further.  That  my  suggestions  were  not  followed, 
nor  anything  akin  to  them,  the  public  sadly  knows.  And  the  conclusion 
to  which  I  have  been  most  reluctantly  forced  is,  that  the  President  did  not 
want  harmony  with  Congress,  that  he  had  already  made  up  his  mind  to 
break  with  the  party  which  had  elected  him,  and  seek  a  further  lease  of 
power  through  the  favour  and  support  of  its  implacable  enemies. 

The  difference  between  Congress  and  the  President  became 
so  great  that  he  was  at  last  impeached  by  the  House  of  Rep- 
resentatives for  high  crimes  and  misdemeanours.  The  trial  of 
the  impeachment  in  the  Senate  was  conducted  with  notable 
ability  both  on  the  side  of  the  impeachment  and  that  of  the 
defense.  The  country  took  profound  interest  in  the  proceed- 
ings, which  were  reported  with  great  fullness  by  the  daily 
press.  Among  the  journals  most  earnestly  advocating  impeach- 
ment was  The  New- York  Tribune,  but  at  this  time  Mr. 
G-reeley  himself  was  absent  in  the  West,  his  journal  being  in 
charge  of  his  then  lieutenant,  Mr.  John  Russell  Young.  Had 
Mr.  Greeley  himself  been  in  charge,  some  of  the  intemperate 
expressions  of  The  Tribune  would  never  have  appeared. 

Impeachment  failed.  The  President  was  acquitted,  though 
a  large  majority  of  members  voted  for  conviction,  to  secure 
which  a  two-thirds  majority  was  necessary.  There  was  a  tre- 
mendous popular  clamour  in  the  Republican  party  against 
those  Senators  of  that  party  who  voted  against  impeachment; 
as  though  a  matter  of  this  sort  were  subject  for  party  disci- 
pline! Those  Senators  were  sublimely  in  the  right  who  main- 
tained their  independent  judgment,  —  whether  it  was  correct 
or  erroneous,  —  in  a  matter  of  this  kind,  and  who  indignantly 
repelled  all  attempts  to  swerve -them  from  their  duty  as  they 
had  undertaken  to  perform  it  by  solemn  oath. 

Upon  the  question  of  Reconstruction,  out  of  which  impeach- 
ment grew,  Horace  Greeley  had  clear  and  carefully  considered 
views.  They  might  be  summed  up  in  a  single  phrase, — 
amnesty  for  the  past,  all  rights  for  all  men,  white  and  black, 
now  and  in  the  future.  These  views  will  be  found  best  stated, 
perhaps,  in  his  celebrated  Richmond  speech,  delivered  on  the 


426  LIFE  Of  HORACE   QREELEY. 

occasion  of  his  visit  to  that  city  for  the  purpose  of  relieving 
the  government  of  farther  responsibility  in  the  incarceration 
of  Mr.  Jefferson  Davis. 

This  address  is  printed,  as  reported  at  the  time,  in  the 
Appendix  to  this  volume.  Had  the  views  then  and  there 
announced  by  Mr.  Greeley  been  forthwith  adopted,  there  can 
be  little  doubt  that  much  subsequent  misunderstanding,  heart- 
burning, unhappy  ill  will  between  the  different  sections  of  the 
restored  Union  might  have  been  avoided.  Herein,  as  was  so 
often  the  case  with  him,  he  was  in  advance  of  his  cotempor- 
aries.  To  adopt  a  figure  used  by  Theodore  Parker  in  his 
memorable  address  upon  the  death  of  Daniel  Webster,  most 
men  pass  from  mountain-top  to  mountain-top,  like  the  beast 
of  burddn,  by  slowly  trudging  down  into  and  across  the  valley 
and  laboriously  working  their  way  up ;  while  men  of  genius 
pass  swiftly  over  the  expanse  as  though  on  the  wings  of  the 
eagle.  Mr.  G-reeley's  liberal  views  upon  reconstruction,  though 
at  last  finally  adopted,  at  least  in  theory,  by  the  government, 
were  at  the  time  now  under  consideration  greatly  misappre- 
hended. And  from  this  resulted  certain  illiberal  legislation, 
which  had  been  entirely  unnecessary  had  his  policy  been  sus- 
tained. To  this  legislation  he  felt  constrained  to  yield  reluctant 
assent,  whereby  he  was  temporarily  involved  in  apparent  rather 
than  real  inconsistency.  At  this  time,  he  thought  it  better  to 
sustain  the  government,  against  his  personal  judgment,  than 
to  assail  what  many  regarded  as  a  necessarily  harsh  measure  in 
the  interest  of  peace. 


OHAPTEE   XXIY. 

HORACE  GREELEY  AND  JEFFERSON  DAVIS. 

Jefferson  Davis,  Escaping  from  Richmond,  Is  Captured — Confined  at 
Fortress  Monroe  —  Impracticability  of  Trial  —  Horace  Greeley's  Inter- 
view with  Senator  Wade,  of  Ohio,  on  the  Subject  of  Bailing  Mr.  Davis 
—  Mr.  Greeley  is  Dissuaded  from  the  Project  —  But  at  Length  Finally 
Resolves  to  Go  Upon  the  Bond — Visits  Richmond  for  that  Purpose  — 
The  Scene  in  the  Court  Room  — Mr.  Greeley's  Richmond  Speech-* 
Effect  of  this  Act  of  Magnanimity  Upon  the  Public. 

TJpoK  the  collapse  of  the  rebellion,  Mr.  Jefferson  Davis,  who 
had  all  the  while  been  President  of  the  Southern  Confederacy, 
escaped  from  Richmond  with  his  family.  The  Executive  De- 
partment of  the  Union  government  offered  a  large  reward  for 
his  capture.  Nevertheless,  it  is  probably  true  that  in  all  the 
great  solicitudes  of  President  Lincoln's  life,  the  greatest  was 
that  which  caused  him  to  fear  Mr.  Davis  might  be  captured. 
Nothing  is  more  certain  than  that  Mr.  Lincoln  fervently 
wished  the  escape  of  the  late  President  of  the  late  de-facto 
rebel  government.  He  is  known  to  have  said  that  "  if  Davis 
were  taken  he  would  be  the  biggest  elephant  on  our  hands  we 
have  had  yet,  and  we  have  had  some  large-sized  animals.'* 
The  President's  assassination  so  greatly  aroused  the  feelings 
of  all  good  people  whether  in  one  part  of  the  country  or' 
another,  that  the  proclamations  and  speeches  of  his  successor, 
breathing  threatenings  and  slaughter,  seemed  to  be  heartily 
sympathized  with. 

It  was  Mr.  Greeley's  opinion  that  had  Mr.  Davis,  imme- 
diately after  his  capture,  been  tried  by  "drum-head  court- 
martial,"  convicted,  and  put  to  death,  the  proceeding  would 
have  been  generally  approved  at  the  time,  whatever  the  sober 
second  thought  of  the  people  might  have  been.  But  he  was 
not  tried  by  drum -head  nor  any  other  court-martial.  Escorted 
under  strong  guard  to  Savannah,  Georgia,  he  was  thence  taken 

(427) 


428  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GREELEY. 

by  sea  to  Fortress  Monroe,  and  placed  in  close  confinement  as 
a  military  prisoner.  "  An  indictment  for  treason  was  found 
against  him,"  says  Mr.  Greeley;  "but  he  remained  a  military 
prisoner  in  close  jail  for  nearly  two  years,  before  even  a  pre- 
tence was  made  of  arraigning  him  for  trial." 

The  truth  is,  the  trial  of  Mr.  Davis,  under  the  indictment 
which  was  found  against  him  was  impracticable.  It  was  cer- 
tain that  he  was  guilty;  it  seemed  to  be  equally  certain  that  a 
jury  could  not  be  empannelled  in  Virginia  which  would  con- 
vict him,  if  indeed,  one  could  be  empannelled  at  all  under  the 
ancient  rules  of  law  which  pertained  to  that  time-honoured 
institution.  The  government  had  erred, — if  error  there  was 
in  this  matter, — in  not  having  Mr.  Davis  and  a  few  others 
promptly  tried  under  a  jurisdiction  where  trial  would  have 
been  neither  a  farce  nor  a  mockery.  This  first  error  resulted 
in  a  second  one,  namely,  the  long  incarceration  of  Mr.  Davis 
at  Fortress  Monroe.  If  he  was  entitled  to  his  life,  he  was 
entitled  to  a  speedy  trial.  And  this  last,  as  we  have  seen,  was 
impracticable  in  Virginia.  If  the  prisoner  could  not  be  tried, 
he  was  entitled  to  his  liberty. 

At  length  Mr.  Greeley  was  consulted  by  Mr.  George  Shea, 
Mr.  Davis's  counsel  of  record  in  the  case,  upon  the  feasibility 
of  procuring  the  names  of  persons  on  the  prisoner's  bond  to 
appear  for  trial  at  the  mandate  of  the  court,  who  had  been 
conspicuous  Unionists  throughout  the  war.  Mr.  Greeley  named 
two  such  persons,  eminent  in  the  country,  and,  after  reflection, 
added:  "If  my  name  should  be  found  necessary,  you  may 
use  that."  Months  afterwards,  he  was  apprised  by  a  telegram 
from  Washington  that  his  name  was  needed,  and  he  proceeded 
to  the  Capital  with  the  object  of  proffering  it. 

Arrived  at  "Washington,  he  found  many  true  and  life-long 
friends  who  doubted  the  policy  of  his  proposed  action  in  the 
matter.  He  had  a  long  interview  with  Senator  Wade,  of  Ohio, 
upon  the  subject,  after  he  had  talked  with  many  others. 
Among  all  our  public  men  there  has  not  been  one  more  noted 
for  plainness  of  speech  than  Benjamin  F.  Wade,  unless  it  were 
Ilorace  Greeley  himself.  There  was  very  little  bowing  and 
scraping  done  on  the  occasion  of  this  interview.  It  was  a  fair 


INTERVIEW   WITH   SENATOB   WADE.  429 

and  square  stand-up  fight, — if  I  may  use  a  sporting  figure, — 
and  Mr.  Greeley  at  length  threw  up  the  sponge.  He  insisted 
that  the  longer  continuance  of  Mr.  Davis's  imprisonment 
could  result  only  in  evil;  in  postponing  the  return  of  cordial 
relations  between  the  people  of  the  South  and  those  of  the 
North;  that  his  confinement  only  made  a  martyr  of  him;  that 
he  was  entitled  by  law,  to  a  speedy  trial  or  a  speedy  release; 
that  humanity,  magnanimity  manifested  toward  him  could  only 
have  a  good  effect  upon  the  best  people  of  the  South.  To 
these  and  other  arguments  Mr.  Wade  did  not  attempt  a  reply. 
He  said  that,  even  if  all  these  things  are  so,  "  You,  Mr.  Greeley, 
are  not  the  right  man  to  go  upon  the  bond.  You  must  recol- 
lect," he  urged,  "  that  you  are  not  a  simple  citizen.  You  are 
the  editor  of  a  great  journal;  you  are  a  representative  man  of 
the  Republican  party.  The  people  believe  that  Jeff.  Davis 
ought  to  be  tried  as  a  traitor,  convicted  as  a  traitor,  and  hung 
as  a  traitor.  And,  whether  they  are  right  or  wrong,  you,  as 
editor  of  The  New- York  Tribune,  and  a  trusted  leader  of  the 
party,  cannot  afford  to  do  this  thing.  I  tell  you  if  you  do  it 
it  will  kick  up  such  a  dust  as  even  your  eyes  have  never  been 
stuffed  with  before."  Statements  of  this  kind,  and  earnest 
appeals  on  the  part  of  this  then  devoted  friend,  as  well  as  of 
others,  dissuaded  Mr.  Greeley  at  this  time  from  the  determina- 
tion he  had  made,  and  he  returned  to  New- York,  convinced  of 
the  impolicy  but  not  of  the  unwisdom  of  the  act  he  had  con- 
templated. 

But  upon  still  further  reflection,  Mr.  Greeley  concluded  that 
it  was  his  duty  under  the  circumstances  to  go  upon  the  bond, 
regardless  of  ill  consequences  to  himself.  He,  therefore,  pro- 
ceeded to  the  city  of  Richmond,  for  that  purpose,  and  upon 
special  invitation.  One  of  our  noblest  philanthropists,  Mr. 
Gerrit  Smith,  also  signed  the  bond,  as  did  John  Minor  Botts, 
a  Virginian,  and  a  Union  man  throughout  the  war,  Mr.  Cor- 
nelius Vanderbilt,  of  New- York,  and  a  considerable  number 
of  other  men,  eminent  in  politics  or  in  business. 

The  scene  in  the  court-room,  on  this  memorable  13th  of 
May,  1867,  was  one  of  great  impressiveness.  Mr.  Greeley  had 
scarcely  laid  down  his  pen,  when  the  prisoner  grasped  his  hand 


430  LIFE   OTf  HORACiS  GREELEY. 

and  uttered  a  few  words  of  grateful  acknowledgement.  Mr 
Greeley  returned  the  greeting  and  in  a  few  homely  sentences 
expressed  his  gratification  that  he  had  been  able  to  do  him  a 
service.  Judge  Underwood  then  declared:  "The  Marshal 
will  now  discharge  the  prisoner  from  custody,"  whereupon  the 
long  pent-up  feelings  of  Mr.  Davis's  friends  burst  forth  in 
shouts  which  the  Marshal  was  utterly  unable  for  some  time  to 
repress.  Amid  the  excitement  Mr.  Greeley  quietly  took  his 
departure  from  the  animated  scene  which  he  had  himself 
chiefly  created. 

Before  leaving  Richmond,  Mr.  Greeley  was  invited  to  deliver 
a  speech  before  the  people.  He  accepted  the  invitation,  and 
addressed  the  people  at  the  African  Church,  very  often  used 
for  political  meetings  on  account  of  its  great  size.  The  im- 
mense building  was  crowded,  the  main  body  being  occupied 
by  persons  of  high  social  standing,  most  of  whom  had  taken 
sides  with  the  Confederacy  during  the  war>  the  aisles  and  gal- 
leries being  filled  with  coloured  people.  The  speech  delivered 
by  Mr.  Greeley,  though  strictly  extemporaneous,  was  one  of 
great  thoughtfulness,  power,  and  statesmanlike  wisdom.  It 
pandered  neither  to  Southern  whites  nor  Southern  blacks,  but 
showed  a  noble,  a  lofty  friendship  for  both,  and  recommended 
reconstruction,  the  return  of  thorough  peace  upon  principles 
of  benignant  philanthropy  and  universal  political  and  civil 
rights. 

Mr.  Greeley's  act  of  magnanimity, — for  such,  so  far  as  he 
was  concerned,  it  certainly  was,  —  had  a  two-fold  effect;  or, 
rather,  it  was  followed  by  two  series  of  results  widely  different 
the  one  from  the  other.  In  the  South,  it  was  highly  applauded, 
and  quite  generally  looked  upon  as  the  forerunner  of  thorough 
pacification.  "  Let  us  all  show,"  said  The  Richmond  Whig, 
"that  Northern  generosity  is  the  true  avenue  to  Southern 
friendship.  We  repeat,  a  great  stride  was  yesterday  taken  in 
the  line  of  reconstruction."  "  We  hail  the  event,"  said  an  old 
and  influential  Virginia  journal,  "  as  an  auspicious  one,  fraught 
with  good,  and  recognize  the  present  as  a  fortunate  time  for 


EFFECT  OF   BAlLOG   Mfc.   JbAVIS.  431 

both  sections  of  the  Union  to  set  out  with  a  new  purpose,  to 
bury-their  animosities,  and  meet  together  on  a  common  ground 
of  justice,  peace,  and  fraternity."  But  the  Richmond  corres- 
pondent of  The  Baltimore  Sun  summed  up  the  whole  matter 
about  as  complete! y  and  truthfully  as  any  other  writer. 
Said  he: 


The  effect  of  Mr.  Davis's  release  ifl  all  parts  of  the  State  has  been  not 
only  cheering  and  exhilirating,  but  it  has  done  more  to  promote  good  feel- 
ing, real  cordiality,  toward  the  North  and  toward  the  government,  than 
any  event  which  has  occurred  since  the  close  of  the  war.  I  have  not  seen 
till  now  any  reason  to  believe  that  the  South  would,  for  years,  do  more  than 
accept  the  situation,  and  content  herself  with  a  perfunctory  performance 
of  the  obligations  she  has  assumed;  but  the  release  of  Mr.  Davis  has 
touched  the  Southern  heart,  and  I  believe  that  it  is  at  this  moment  beating 
strong  to  the  old  music  of  nationality  and  brotherly  love.  The  appear- 
ance  in  Court,  of  Mr.  Horace  Greeley  and  Mr.  Gerrit  Smith,  and  their 
noble  interposition  in  behalf  of  Mr.  Davis,  have  had  peculiar  influence  ia 
bringing  about  this  happy  result.  Our  people  look  upon  them  as  fepf& 
sentative  Northern  men,  and  the  hand  thus  stretched  out  to  thetn  they  have 
grasped  warmly.  This  time  it  is  no  dramatic  grasp,  but  palpably  honest, 
and  prompted  by  full  hearts. 


Similar  expressions  came  up  from  all  parts  of  the  South. 
Unhappily  Mr.  Greeley  and  Mr.  Gerrit  Smith  did  not,  on 
account  of  certain  presumed  party  necessities,  herein  appear  to 
be  "  representative  Northern  men."  Immediate  and  noisy 
clamour  was  raised  against  the  act.  Statesmen  who  in  private 
admitted  the  necessity  of  Mr.  Davis's  release,  nevertheless 
added  their  public  voice  to  increase  the  general  condemnation* 
And  thus  by  one  means  or  another,  the  victorious  North,  with 
whom  magnanimity  would  have  been  easy,  was  made  to  appear 
unwilling  to  meet  the  South  on  a  common  ground  of  justice, 
peace,  and  fraternity.  The  South  asked  ol  us  bread  and  we 
gave  her  a  stone.  It  was  in  spite  of  Horace  Greeley's  earnest 
efforts  that  the  North  was  placed  in  this  false  position.  The 
good  that  he  would  have  done  was  retarded,  indefinitely  post- 
poned, by  many  who  should  have  bravely  sustained  him. 

The  effect  upon  himself  of  this  magnanimous  act  was  then 


4:32  LIFE  OS   HORACE  GREELEY. 

and  afterwards  unpleasant  and  disastrous.  Many  .Republican 
journals  severely  criticised  what  he  had  done;  few  heartily 
endorsed  the  deed.  He  was  a  member  of  a  Union  League 
Club  of  New- York.  Certain  members  thereof  proposed  to 
u  discipline  "  him  for  his  doings  in  the  premises.  Whereupon, 
he  wrote  an  open  letter  in  The  Tribune,  which  not  only  explains 
his  conduct,  vindicates  it,  and  tells  some  plain  truths  on  the 
subject  in  hand,  but  also  has  no  little  historical,  as  well  as 
biographical  significance.  Wherefore,  I  judge  it  well  that  it 
may  appear  here  in  full: 

BY  THESE  PRESENTS  GREETING  I 

To  MESSRS.  GEORGE  W.  BLUNT,  JOHN  A.  KENNEDY,  JOHN  O.  STONE, 
STEPHEN  HYATT,  and  thirty  others,  members  of  the  Union  League 
Club: 

GENTLEMEN. — I  was  favoured,  on  the  16th  inst.,  by  an  official  note  from 
our  ever-courteous  President,  John  Jay,  notifying  me  that  a  requisition  had 
been  presented  to  him  for  "  a  special  meeting  of  the  Club  at  an  early  day,  for 
the  purpose  of  taking  into  consideration  the  conduct  of  Horace  Greeley,  a 
member  of  the  Club,  who  has  become  a  bondsman  for  Jefferson  Davis,  late 
chief  officer  of  the  Rebel  government."  Mr.  Jay  continues : 

"As  I  have  reason  to  believe  that  the  signers,  or  some  of  them,  disapprove  of  the 
conduct  which  they  propose  the  Club  shall  consider,  it  is  clearly  due,  both  to  the  Club 
and  to  yourself,  that  you  should  have  the  opportunity  of  being  heard  on  the  subject;  I 
beg,  therefore,  to  aak  on  what  evening  it  will  be  convenient  for  yon  that  I  call  the  meet- 
ing,"  etc.,  etc. 

In  my  prompt  reply  I  requested  the  President  to  give  you  reasonable 
time  for  reflection,  but  assured  him  that  /  wanted  none ;  since  I  should 
not  attend  the  meeting,  nor  ask  any  friend  to  do  so,  and  should  make  no 
defence,  nor  offer  aught  in  the  way  of  self-vindication.  I  am  sure  my 
friends  in  the  Club  will  not  construe  this  as  implying  disrespect;  but  it  ia 
not  my  habit  to  take  part  in  any  discussions  which  may  arise  among 
other  gentlemen  as  to  my  fitness  to  enjoy  their  society.  That  is  their  affair 
altogether,  and  to  them  I  leave  it 

The  single  point  whereon  I  have  any  occasion  or  wish  to  address  you  is 
your  virtual  implication,  that  there  is  something  novel,  unexpected, 
astounding,  in  my  conduct  in  the  matter  suggested  by  you  as  the  basis  of 
your  action.  I  choose  not  to  rest  under  this  assumption,  but  to  prove  that 
you,  being  persons  of  ordinary  intelligence,  must  know  better.  On  this 
point  I  cite  you  to  a  scrutiny  of  the  record : — 

The  surrender  of  General  Lee  was  made  known  in  this  city  at  11  p.  M. 
of  Sunday,  April  9, 1865,  and  fitly  announced  in  The  Tribune  of  next  morn- 
ing  April  10th.  On  that  very  day,  I  wrote,  and  next  morning  printed  in 
these  columns,  a  leader  entitled  "Magnanimity  in  Triumph,"  wherein 
I 


LETTER  TO   UNION   LEAGUE   CLUB.  433 

"We  hear  men  say:  'Yes,  forgive  the  great  mass  of  those  who  have  been  misled  Into 
rebellion,  but  punish  the  leaders  as  they  deserve.'  But  who  can  accurately  draw  the  line 
between  leaders  and  followers  in  the  premises  ?  By  what  test  shall  they  be  discrimin- 
ated? *  *  *  *  Where  is  your  touchstone  of  leadership?  We  know  of  none. 

"  Nor  can  we  agree  with  those  who  would  punish  the  original  plotters  of  secession,  yet 
spare  their  ultimate  and  scarcely  willing  converts.  On  the  contrary,  while  we  would 
revive  or  inflame  resentment  against  none  of  them,  we  feel  far  less  antipathy  to  the  orig- 
inal upholders  of 'the  resolutions  of '98,'— to  the  disciples  of  Calhoun  and  McDuffie,— to 
the  nullifiers  of  1832,  and  the  'State  Rights'  men  of  1850,— than  to  the  John  Bells, 
Humphrey  Marshalls,  and  Alexander  H.  H.  Stuarts,  who  were  schooled  in  the  national 
faith,  and  who,  in  becoming  diaunionists  and  Rebels,  trampled  on  the  professions  of  a 
lifetime,  and  spurned  the  logic  wherewith  they  had  so  often  unanswerably  demonstrated 
that  secession  was  treason.  *  *  *  *  We  consider  Jefferson  Davis  this  day  a  less 
culpable  traitor  than  John  Bell. 

"  But  we  cannot  believe  it  wise  or  well  to  take  the  life  of  any  man  who  shall  have  sub- 
mitted to  the  national  authority.  The  execution  of  even  one  such  would  be  felt  as  a 
personal  stigma  by  every  one  who  had  aided  the  Rebel  cause.  Each  would  say  to  him- 
self, 'I  am  as  culpable  as  he;  we  differ  only  in  that  I  am  deemed  of  comparatively  little 
consequence.'  A  single  Confederate  led  out  to  execution  would  be  evermore  enshrined 
in  a  million  hearts  as  a  conspicuous  hero  and  martyr.  We  cannot  realize  that  it  would  be 
wholesome  or  safe  —  we  are  sure  itwould  not  be  magnanimous  —  to  give  the  overpowered 
disloyalty  of  the  South  such  a  shrine.  Would  the  throne  of  the  house  of  Hanover  stand 
more  firmly  had  Charles  Edward  been  caught  and  executed  after  Culloden?  Is  Austrian 
domination  in  Hungary  more  stable  to-day  for  the  hanging  of  Nagy  Sandor  and  his  twelve 
compatriots  after  the  surrender  of  Vilagos  ? 

"We  plead  against  passions  certain  to  be  at  this  moment  fierce  and  intolerant;  but 
on  our  side  are  the  ages  and  the  voice  of  history.  We  plead  for  a  restoration  of  the 
Union,  against  a  policy  which  would  afford  a  momentary  gratification  at  the  cost  of  years 
of  perilous  hate  and  bitterness.  *  *  *  * 

"  Those  who  invoke  military  execution  for  the  vanquished,  or  even  for  their  leaders, 
we  suspect  will  not  generally  be  found  among  the  few  who  have  long  been  exposed  to 
unjust  odium  as  haters  of  the  South,  because  they  abhorred  slavery.  And,  as  to  the  long- 
oppressed  and  degraded  blacks, —  so  lately  the  slaves,  destined  still  to  be  the  neighbours, 
and  (we  trust)  at  no  distant  day  the  fellow-citizens  of  the  Southern  whites, — we  are  sure 
that  their  voice,  could  it  be  authentically  uttered,  would  ring  out  decidedly,  sonorously, 
on  the  side  of  clemency,  of  humanity." 

On  the  next  day  I  had  some  more  in  this  spirit,  and  on  the  13th,  an 
elaborate  leader,  entitled  "  Peace, —  Punishment,"  in  the  course  of  which  I 
said : — 

"The  New-York  Times,  doing  injustice  to  its  own  sagacity  in  a  characteristic  attempt 
to  sail  between  wind  and  water,  says :  '  Let  us  hang  Jefferson  Davis  and  spare  the  rest.' 
*  *  *  \yre  ,jo  not  concur  in  the  advice.  Davis  did  not  devise  nor  instigate  the  Rebel- 
lion; on  the  contrary,  he  was  one  of  the  latest  and  most  reluctant  of  the  notables  of  the 
Cotton  States  to  renounce  definitively  the  Union.  His  prominence  is  purely  official  and 
representative ;  the  only  reason  for  hanging  him  is  that  you  therein  condemn  and  stig- 
matize more  persons  than  in  hanging  any  one  else.  There  is  not  an  ex-Rebel  in  the 
world  —  no  matter  how  penitent — who  will  not  have  unpleasant  sensations  about  the 
neck  on  the  day  when  the  Confederate  President  is  to  be  hung.  And  to  what  good  end? 

"We  insist  that  this  matter  must  not  be  regarded  in  any  narrow  aspect.  We  are 
most  anxious  to  secure  the  assent  of  the  South  to  emancipation ;  not  that  assent  which 
the  condemned  gives  to  being  hung  when  he  shakes  hands  with  his  jailer  and  thanks 
him  for  past  acts  of  kindness;  but  that  hearty  assent  which  can  only  be  won  by  mag- 
nanimity. Perhaps  the  Rebels,  as  a  body,  would  have  given,  even  one  year  ago,  as  large 
and  as  hearty  a  vote  for  hanging  the  writer  of  this  article  as  any  other  man  living;  hence, 
It  more  especially  seems  to  him  important  to  prove  that  the  civilization  based  on  free 
•bour  is  of  a  higher  and  humaner  type  than  that  based  on  slavery.  We  cannot  realize 

28 


434  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

that  the  gratification  to  enure  to  oar  friends  from  the  hanging  of  any  one  man,  or  fifty 
men,  should  be  allowed  to  outweigh  this  consideration.1' 

On  the  following  day  I  wrote  again : — 

"  We  entreat  the  President  promptly  to  do  and  dare  in  the  cause  of  magnanimity.  The 
Southern  mind  is  now  open  to  kindness,  and  may  be  magnetically  affected  by  gener- 
osity. Let  assurance  at  once  be  given  that  there  is  to  be  a  general  amnesty  and  no 
general  confiscation.  This  is  none  the  less  the  dictate  of  wisdom,  because  it  is  also  the 
dictate  of  mercy.  What  we  ask  is,  that  the  President  say  in  effect,  '  Slavery  having, 
through  rebellion,  committed  suicide,  let  the  North  and  the  South  nnite  to  bury  the 
carcass,  and  then  clasp  hands  across  the  grave.' " 

The  evening  of  that  day  witnessed  that  most  appalling  calamity,  the 
murder  of  President  Lincoln,  which  seemed  in  an  instant  to  curdle  all  the 
milk  of  human  kindness  in  twenty  millions  of  American  breasts.  At  once 
insidious  efforts  were  set  on  foot  to  turn  the  fury  thus  engendered  against 
me,  because  of  my  pertinacious  advocacy  of  mercy  to  the  vanquished. 
Chancing  to  enter  the  Club-House  the  next  (Saturday)  evening,  I  received 
a  full  broadside  of  your  scowls,  ere  we  listened  to  a  clerical  harangue 
intended  to  prove  that  Mr.  Lincoln  had  been  providentially  removed 
because  of  his  notorious  leanings  toward  clemency,  in  order  to  make  way 
for  a  successor  who  would  give  the  Rebels  a  full  measure  of  stern  justice. 
I  was  soon  made  to  comprehend  that  I  had  no  sympathizers — or  none 
who  dared  seem  such  —  in  your  crowded  assemblage.  And  some  maladroit 
admirer  having,  a  few  days  afterward,  made  the  Club  a  present  of  my  por- 
trait,  ite  bare  reception  was  resisted  in  a  speech  from  the  chair  by  your 
then  President, —  a  speech  whose  vigorous  invective  was  justified  solely  by 
my  pleadings  for  lenity  to  the  Rebels. 

At  ouce  a  concerted  howl  of  denunciation  and  rage  was  sent  up  from 
every  side  against  me  by  the  little  creatures  whom  God,  for  some  inscrut- 
able purpose,  permits  to  edit  a  majority  of  our  minor  journals,  echoed  by 
a  yell  of  "  Stop  my  paper ! "  from  thousands  of  imperfectly  instructed 
readers  of  The  Tribune.  One  impudent  puppy  wrote  me  to  answer  cate- 
gorically whether  I  was  or  was  not  in  favour  of  hanging  Jefferson  Davis, 
adding  that  I  must  stop  his  paper  if  I  were  not !  Scores  volunteered  assur- 
ances that  I  was  defying  public  opinion ;  that  most  of  my  readers  were 
against  me ;  as  if  I  could  be  induced  to  write  what  they  wished  said  rather 
than  what  they  needed  to  be  told.  I  never  before  realized  so  vividly  the 
baseness  of  the  editorial  vocation,  according  to  the  vulgar  conception  of  it. 
The  din  raised  about  my  ears  now  is  nothing  to  that  I  then  endured  and 
despised.  I  am  humiliated  by  the  reflection  that  it  is  (or  was)  in  the  power 
of  such  insects  to  annoy  me,  even  by  pretending  to  discover  with  surprise 
something  that  I  have  for  years  been  publicly,  emphatically  proclaiming. 

I  must  hurry  over  much  that  deserves  a  paragraph,  to  call  your  attention 
distinctly  to  occurences  in  November  last.  Upon  the  Republicans  having, 
by  desperate  effort,  handsomely  carried  our  State  against  a  forn?idable- 
looking  combination  of  recent  and  venomous  apostates  with  our  natural 
adversaries,  a  cry  arose  from  several  quarters  that  I  ought  to  be  chosen 


LETTER  TO   UNION   LEAGUE  CLUB.  435 

United  States  Senator.  At  once,  kind,  discreet  friends  swarmed  about  me, 
whispering,  "  Only  keep  still  about  universal  amnesty,  and  your  election  is 
certain.  Just  be  quiet  a  few  weeks,  and  you  can  say  what  you  please 
thereafter.  You  have  no  occasion  to  speak  now."  I  slept  on  the  well- 
meant  suggestion,  and  deliberately  concluded  that  I  could  not,  in  justice 
to  myself,  defer  to  it.  I  could  not  purchase  office  by  even  passive,  nega- 
.tive  dissimulation.  No  man  should  be  enabled  to  say  to  me,  in  truth,  "  If 
I  had  supposed  you  would  persist  in  your  rejected,  condemned  amnesty 
hobby,  I  would  not  have  given  you  my  vote."  So  I  wrote  and  published, 
on  the  27th  of  that  month,  my  manifesto  entitled  "  The  True  Basis  of 
Reconstruction,"  wherein,  repelling  the  idea  that  I  proposed  a  dicker  with 
the  ex-Rebels,  I  explicitly  said : —  ^ 

"I  am  for  universal  amnesty,  BO  far  as  immunity  from  fear  of  punishment  or  couflsca 
tion  is  concerned,  even  though  impartial  suffrage  should,  for  the  present,  be  defeated. 
I  did  thinly  it  desirable  that  Jefferson  Davis  should  be  arraigned  and  tried  for  treason ; 
and  it  still  seems  to  me  that  this  might  properly  have  been  done  many  months  ago.  But 
it  was  not  done  then ;  and  now  I  believe  it  would  result  in  far  more  evil  than  good.  It 
would  rekindle  passions  that  have  nearly  burned  out  or  been  hushed  to  sleep ;  it  would 
fearfully  convulse  and  agitate  the  South ;  it  would  arrest  the  progress  of  reconciliation 
and  kindly  feeling  there;  it  would  cost  a  large  sum  directly,  and  a  far  larger  indirectly; 
and,  unless  the  jury  were  scandalously  packed,  it  would  result  in  a  non-agreement  or  no 
verdict.  I  can  imagine  no  good  end  to  be  subserved  by  such  a  trial ;  and,  holding  Davis 
neither  better  nor  worse  than  several  others,  would  have  him  treated  as  they  are." 

Is  it  conceivable  that  men  who  can  read,  and  who  were  made  aware  of 
this  declaration, —  for  most  of  you  were  present  and  shouted  approval  of 
Mr.  Fessenden's  condemnation  of  my  views  at  the  Club,  two  or  three  even- 
ings thereafter, —  can  now  pretend  that  my  aiding  to  have  Davis  bailed  is 
something  novel  and  unexpected? 

Gentlemen,  I  shall  not  attend  your  meeting  this  evening.  I  have  an 
engagement  out  of  town,  and  shall  keep  it.  I  do  not  recognize  you  as 
capable  of  judging,  or  even  fully  apprehending  me.  You  evidently  regard 
me  as  a  weak  sentimentalist,  misled  by  a  maudlin  philosophy.  I  arraign 
you  as  narrow-minded  blockheads,  who  would  like  to  be  useful  to  a  great 
and  good  cause,  but  don't  know  how.  Your  attempt  to  base  a  great, 
enduring  party  on  the  hate  and  wrath  necessarily  engendered  by  a  bloody 
civil  war,  is  as  though  you  should  plant  a  colony  on  an  iceberg  which  had 
somehow  drifted  into  a  tropical  ocean,  I  tell  you  here,  that,  out  of  a  life 
earnestly  devoted  to  the  good  of  human  kind,  your  children  will  select  my 
going  to  Richmond  and  signing  that  bail-bond  as  the  wisest  act,  and  will 
feel  that  it  did  move  for  freedom  and  humanity  than  all  of  you  were  com- 
petent to  do,  though  you  had  lived  to  the  age  of  Methuselah. 

I  ask  nothing  of  yon,  then,  but  that  you  proceed  to  your  end  by  a  direct, 
frank,  manly  way.  Don't  sidle  off  into  a  mild  resolution  of  censure, 
bat  move  the  expulsion  which  you  purposed,  and  which  I  deserve,  if  I 
deserve  any  reproach  whatever.  All  I  care  for  is,  that  you  make  this  a 
square,  stand-up  fight,  and  record  your  judgment  by  yeas  and  nays.  I  care 
not  how  few  vote  with  me,  nor  how  many  vote  against  me ;  for  I  know 
that  the  latter  will  repent  it  in  dust  and  ashes  before  three  years  have 


436  UFE  OF  HORACE  GREELET. 

passed.  Understand,  once  for  all,  that  I  dare  you  and  defy  you,  and  that 
I  propose  to  fight  it  out  on  the  line  that  I  liave  held  from  the  day  of  Lee'a 
surrender.  So  long  as  any  man  was  seeking  to  overthrow  our  government, 
he  was  my  enemy;  from  the  hour  in  which  he  laid  down  his  arms,  he  was 
my  formerly  erring  countryman.  So  long  as  any  is  at  heart  opposed  to 
the  national  unity,  the  Federal  authority,  or  to  that  assertion  of  the  equal 
rights  of  all  men  which  has  become  practically  identified  with  loyalty  and 
nationality,  I  shall  do  my  best  to  deprive  him  of  power;  but,  whenever  he 
ceases  to  be  thus,  I  demand  his  restoration  to  all  the  privileges  of  Ameri- 
can  citizenship.  I  give  you  fair  notice,  that  I  shall  urge  the  re-enfran- 
chisement  of  those  now  proscribed  for  rebellion  so  soon  as  I  shall  feel  con- 
fident that  this  course  is  con&istent  with  the  freedom  of  the  blacks  and  the 
unity  of  the  Republic,  and  that  I  shall  demand  a  recall  of  all  now  in  exile 
only  for  participating  in  the  Rebellion,  whenever  the  country  shall  have 
been  so  thoroughly  pacified  that  its  safety  will  not  thereby  be  endangered. 
And  so,  gentlemen,  hoping  that  you  will  henceforth  comprehend  me  some- 
what better  than  you  have  done,  I  remain, 

Yours,  HORACE  GREELET. 

NEW- YORK,  May  23, 1867. 

There  are  some  expressions  in  this  letter  which  it  were  to 
be  wished  had  been  omitted,  but  upon  the  whole,  it  was  a 
ringing  defiance  and  challenge  which  Mr.  Greeley's  assailants 
richly  merited  at  his  hands.  The  Club  resolved  that  there 
had  been  nothing  "  in  the  action  of  Horace  Greeley,  relative 
to  the  bailing  of  Jeffarson  Davis,  calling  for  proceedings  in 
this  Club."  Gracious  Clnb! 

One  of  the  most  remarkable  effects  of  the  storm  which  was 
made  to  grow  out  of  this  affair,  was  that  upon  the  sale  of  his 
history  of  the  war.  It  had  previously  been  very  large  and 
steady,  but  for  a  time  after  the  bailing  of  Mr.  Davis  almost 
entirely  ceased,  thousands  who  had  subscribed  for  it  refusing 
to  take  their  copies !  The  storm  having  blown  over,  the  sales 
of  "  The  American  Conflict "  again  became  great  and  steady. 

There  is  one  point  in  the  case  of  Mr.  Greeley's  entering  upon 
Mr.  Davis's  recognizance,  which  I  have  never  seen  properly 
explained.  The  condition  of  the  bond  was,  not  to  get  Mr.  Davis 
released  from  imprisonment,  but  that  he  should  appear  and 
answer  to  the  indictment  which  had  been  found  against  him, 
and  abide  the  order  of  the  court  therein.  If  Mr.  Davis  had 
herein  defaulted,  or  shall  do  so,  then  the  bond  becomes  forfeit, 
and  the  money  payable,  and  not  before.  There  is  no  statute 


JUDGE   CUFFOPO.  437 

of  limitations  against  an  indictment  for  treason.  If  the  gov- 
ernment could  have  wisely  tried  Mr.  Davis,  why  has  it  not 
done  it?  He  is  under  obligation  to  appear  when  called  upon, 
and  undoubtedly  would  appear,  upon  due  summons.  And 
this  among  other  reasons  because  he  would  not  allow  Horace 
Greeley's  bond  to  become  forfeit.  If,  then,  the  government 
was  relieved  of  culpability  for  a  great  cruelty,  without  harm 
to  any  right,  or  injury  to  any  proceeding  connected  with  the 
trial  of  Jefferson  Davis,  the  government  was,  and  still  is, 
indebted  for  it  all  to  the  wisdom  and  courage  and  magna- 
nimity of  Horace  Greeley.  Though  it  is  undoubtedly  true 
that  Mr.  Greeley  herein  rendered  Mr.  Davis  an  incalculably 
great  and  noble  service,  it  is  no  less  true  that  the  service  be 
hereby  rendered  the  government  of  the  United  States  was 
even  greater. 

Having  reflected  as  profoundly  and  candidly  upon  this 
subject  as  I  know  how  to  do,  I  have  deliberately  arrived  at  the 
conclusion,  that  Mr.  Greeley's  act  in  this  matter  was  the  best, 
the  wisest,  the  most  benignant  of  a  long  life  crowded  full  of 
good,  and  wise,  and  benignant  actions.  And  I  doubt  not  that 
the  children  of  those  who  non-concur  herein  will  deliberately 
reverse  the  judgment  of  their  fathers. 


OHAPTEE   XXY. 

MORE  HISTORY  OP  THE  TRIBUNE. 

More  of  Tte  Tribune's  "Isms"  — Proudhon— Endorses  the  Principle  of 
the  "  Woman's  Rights  "  Reform — Advocates  Labour  Reform  —  Asso- 
ciation Adopted  in  The  Tribune  Office  —  An  Era  of  Energetic  Idium 
—  A  Desciption  of  The  Tribune  Establishment  —  How  the  Paper  la 
Edited  — Mention  of  Tribune  Writers  —  The  Composition  Room — 
Press  Room  —  Counting  Room — The  "Weekly"  Day  —  Resum6  of 
Tribune  History  from  Its  Beginning — Vitality  of  a  Great  Journal. 

HAVINQ  accompanied  Mr.  Greeley  through  the  most  momen 
tons  era  of  the  republic's  history:   through  scenes  of  high 
excitement  and  of  stirring,  great  events,  —  a  period  of  the 
hard-won  victory  of  great  ideas:  it  will  be  appropriate  now  to 
recur  to  matters  of  a  more  peaceful,  quiet  nature. 

The  Tribune  continued  to  prosper,  notwithstanding  the  fair 
play  it  gave  to  "  isms,"  — an  "  ism  "  being,  of  course,  an 
unpopular  idea.  Had  The  Tribune  lived  a  little  while  before 
the  discovery  of  America  by  Columbus,  we  make  no  doubt  it 
would  have  given  full  hearing  to  the  theory  of  sphericalism;  to 
the  visionary  notion,  namely,  that  the  earth  is  round.  Had  it 
been  in  existence  so  long  ago  as  the  time  of  Galileo,  it  would 
have  allowed  him  at  least  a  column  a  week  for  the  advocacy  of 
his  visionary  and  heretical  hypothesis  that  the  world  is  a 
moving  rather  than  a  stationary  planet.  For  such  unauthorized 
ideas,  The  Tribune  would  have  been  excommunicated  by  the 
regulars,  and  pronounced  a  dangerous  journal  by  the  interested 
representatives  of  the  flat  and  stand-still  world. 

It  might  appear  to  have  been  Mr.  Greeley's  judgment  that 
every  new  idea,  correct  or  erroneous,  advocated  by  a  respectable 
mind,  with  a  good  object,  was  entitled  to  respectful  considera^ 
tion ;  and  that  every  doctrine,  dogma,  and  practice  which  he 
believed  to  be  wrong  and  hurtful,  should  receive  hearty  con- 
demnati  on,  no  matter  how  unpopular  that  condemnation  might 

(439) 


440  IJFE  OF   HORACE  GBEELEY. 

be.    Thus  ^e  find  him  Baying  at  a  time  when  a  certain  political 
party  of  prescriptive  creed  was  on  the  flood  tide  of  success: 

"We  are  every  day  greeted  by  some  sage  friend  with  a  caution  against  the 
certain  wreck  of  our  influence  and  prosperity  which  we  defy  by  opposing 
the  secret  political  cabal  commonly  known  as  "  the  Know-Nothings." 
One  writes  us  that  he  procured  one  hundred  of  our  present  subscribers, 
and  will  prevent  the  renewal  of  their  subscriptions  in  case  we  persist  in 
our  present  course ;  another  wonders  why  we  will  destroy  our  influence  by 
resisting  the  popular  current,  when  we  might  do  so  much  good  by  falling 
in  with  it  and  guiding  it,  and  so  on. 

To  the  first  of  these  gentlemen  we  say:  "Sir:  We  give  our  time  and 
labour  to  the  production  of  The  Tribune,  because  we  believe  that  to  be  our 
sphere  of  usefulness;  but  we  shall  be  most  happy  to  abandon  journalism 
for  a  less  anxious,  exacting,  exhausting  vocation,  whenever  we  are  fairly 
and  honourably  released  from  this.  You  do  not  frighten  us,  therefore,  by 
any  such  base  appeals  to  our  presumed  selfishness  and  avarice ;  for  if  you 
could  induce  not  merely  your  hundred  but  every  one  of  our  subscribers  to 
desert  us,  we  should  cheerfully  accept  such  a  release  from  our  present 
duties,  and  try  to  earn  a  livelihood  in  some  easier  way.  So  please  go 
ahead!" 

And  now  to  our  would-be  friend  who  suggests  that  we  are  wrecking  our 
influence  by  breasting  the  popular  current:  "Good  sir!  do  you  forget 
that  whatever  influence  or  consideration  The  Tribune  has  attained  has 
been  won,  not  by  sailing  with  the  stream  but  against  it?  On  what  topic 
has  it  ever  swam  with  the  current,  except  in  a  few  instances  wherein  it  has 
aided  to  change  the  current?  Would  anyone  who  conducted  a  journal 
for  popularity's  or  pelfs  sake  be  likely  to  have  taken  the  side  of  liquor 
prohibition,  or  anti-slavery,  or  woman's  rights,  or  suffrage  regardless  of 
colour,  when  we  did?  Would  such  a  one  have  ventured  to  speak  as  we  did  in 
behalf  of  the  anti-renters,  when  everybody  hereabouts  was  banded  to  hunt 
them  down  unheard  ?  Can  you  think  it  probable  that,  after  what  we  have 
dared  and  endured,  we  are  likely  to  be  silenced  now  by  the  cry  that  we  are 
perilling  our  influence?'' 

And  now,  if  any  would  prefer  to  discontinue  The  Tribune  because  it  is 
and  must  remain  opposed  to  every  measure  or  scheme  of  proscription  for 
opinion's  sake,  we  beg  them  not  to  delay  one  minute  on  our  account.  We 
shall  all  live  till  it  is  our  turn  to  die,  whether  we  earn  a  living  by  making 
newspapers  or  by  doing  something  else. 

More  than  fifteen  years  afterwards,  in  the  last  book  of  per- 
manent usefulness  which  came  from  his  pen,  when  speaking  of 
"the  farmer's  calling,"  he  says: 

I  have  repeatedly  been  stung  by  the  receipt  of  letters  gravely  informing 
me  that  my  course  and  views  on  a  current  topic  were  adverse  to  public 


IN  THE  ADVANCE.  44:1 

opinion :  the  writers  evidently  assuming,  as  a  matter  of  course,  that  I  was 
a  mere  jumping-jack,  who  only  needed  to  know  what  other  people  thought 
to  insure  my  instant  and  abject  conformity  to  their  prejudices.  Very  often, 
in  other  days,  I  was  favoured  with  letters  from  indignant  subscribers,  who, 
dissenting  from  my  views  on  some  question,  took  this  method  of  inform- 
ing me  that  they  should  no  longer  take  my  journal  —  a  superfluous  trouble, 
which  could  only  have  meant  dictation  or  insult,  since  they  had  only  to 
refrain  from  renewing  their  subscriptions,  and  their  Tribune  would  stop 
coming,  whenever  they  should  have  received  what  we  owed  them ;  and  it 
would  in  no  case  stop  till  then.  That  a  journalist  was  in  any  sense  a 
public  teacher  —  that  he  necessarily  had  convictions,  and  was  not  likely 
to  suppress  them  because  they  were  not  shared  by  others  —  in  short,  that 
his  calling  was  other  and  higher  than  that  of  a  waiter  at  a  restaurant, 
expected  to  furnish  whatever  was  called  for,  so  long  as  the  pay  was  forth- 
coming  —  these  ex-subscribers  had  evidently  not  for  one  moment  suspected. 
That  such  persons  have  little  or  no  capacity  to  insult,  is  very  true;  and 
yet,  a  man  is  somewhat  degraded  in  his  own  regard  by  learning  that  hia 
vocation  is  held  in  such  low  esteem  by  others.  The  true  farmer  is  proudly 
aware  that  it  is  quite  otherwise  with  his  pursuit — that  no  one  expects  him 
to  swallow  any  creed,  support  any  party,  or  defer  to  any  prejudice,  as  a 
condition  precedent  to  the  sale  of  his  products.  Hence,  I  feel  that  it  is 
easier  and  more  natural  in  his  pursuit  than  in  any  other  for  a  man  to  work 
for  a  living,  and  aspire  to  success  and  consideration,  without  sacrificing 
self-respect,  compromising  integrity,  or  ceasing  to  be  essentially  and 
thoroughly  a  gentleman. 

"  A  very  natural  division  of  mankind,"  once  said  The  Trib- 
une, "  is  that  which  contemplates  them  in  two  classes — those 
who  think  for  themselves,  and  those  who  have  their  thinking 
done  by  others,  dead  or  living.  "With  the  former  class,  the 
paramount  consideration  is — '  What  is  right  ?'  "With  the  lat- 
ter, the  first  inquiry  is — '  "What  do  the  majority,  or  the  great, 
or  the  pious,  or  the  fashionable  think  about  it  ?  How  did  our 
fathers  regard  it  ?  What  will  Mrs.  Grundy  say  ?'  "  This 
appears  to  be  as  thorough  a  description  of  the  conservative  as 
we  can  hope  for.  He  might  possibly  have  the  reform  element 
in  him,  though  consulting  the  majority,  the  great,  the  pious, 
the  fashionable,  the  shades  of  his  ancestors;  but,  consulting 
all  these  and  Mrs.  Grundy,  there  is  no  hope  for  him.  It 
was  Mr.  Greeley's  opinion  that  such  a  conservative  was  "past 
praying  for."  But  again:  "' The  world  does  move,'  and  its 
motive  power,  under  God,  is  the  fearless  thought  and  speech 
of  those  who  dare  be  in  advance  of  their  time — who  are  sneered 


442  LIFE  OF  HOEACE  GREFILKT. 

at  and  shunned  through  their  da^s  of  struggle  and  of  trial  an 
lunatics,  dreamers,  impracticables,  and  visionaries — men  of 
crotchets,  of  vagaries,  or  of  '  isms.'  These  are  the  masts  and 
sails  of  the  ship,  to  which  Conservatism  answers  as  ballast. 
The  ballast  is  important — at  times  indispensable — but  it  would 
be  of  no  account  if  the  ship  were  not  bound  to  go  ahead." 
And  still  again:  "In  a  world  so  full  as  this  of  wrong  and 
suffering,  of  oppression  and  degradation,  there  must  be  radical 
causes  for  so  many  and  so  vast  practical  evils.  It  cannot  be 
that  the  ideas,  beliefs,  institutions,  usages,  prejudices,  whereof 
such  gigantic  miseries  are  born — wherewith  at  least  they  co- 
exist— transcend  criticism  and  rightfully  refuse  scrutiny.  It 
cannot  be  that  the  springs  are  pure  whence  flow  such  turbid 
and  poisonous  currents." 

One  might  fill  a  volume  with  extracts  from  The  Tribune 
showing  the  reform  spirit,  the  spirit  of  radical  reform,  if  you 
please,  of  its  Editor.  Yet  it  is  but  just  to  Mr.  Greeley  to  say 
that  he  did  not  lay  hold  of  every  floating  idea  because  it  hap- 
pened to  be  in  reach,  or  thrust  toward,  him  by  importunate 
advocates.  Though  his  good  nature,  his  abounding  generosity, 
his  trust  in  men,  were  not  seldom  sadly  imposed  upon,  his 
judgment  was  rarely  led  estray.  Let  the  sham,  not  man  or 
woman,  which  deceived  him,  be  named.  In  truth,  innumerable 
instances  of  his  bursting  brilliant  bubbles  with  a  strong  whiff 
from  his  stalwart  mind  might  be  adduced  in  demonstration  of 
his  skeptical  nature.  He  would  not  condemn  a  claim  or  a 
creed  unheard;  and  it  has  already  become  history  that  many 
of  his  visions  of  years  ago  are  the  practical  and  beneficent 
realities  of  the  present. 

Pierre  Joseph  Proudhon,  a  French  writer  of  celebrity,  had 
risen  from  the  ranks  of  Labour,  and  only  a  few  years  after  the 
founding  of  The  New- York  Tribune,  began  to  make  considera- 
ble sensation  in  his  own  country.  He  assailed  society  with 
more  vigorous  diction,  if  not  with  stronger  argumentation, 
than  Fourier.  He  commenced  a  pamphlet  entitled  Qii'est-ce 
q^le  la  ProprittJ  f  with  the  sentence  afterwards  so  celebrated. 
La  proprittS,  Jest  le  vol,  Property  is  Robbery.  To  the  "  isms  " 
of  Proudhon  The  Tribune  gave  respectful  hearing  and  candid 


WOMEN'S  RIGHTS.  443 

criticism.  And,  it  is  submitted,  one  of  the  great  journals  of 
the  time,  whose  Editor  had  himself  risen  from  the  ranks  of 
Labour,  could  not  otherwise  have  received  the  results  of  a 
mind  so  acute  and  daring  as  that  of  Proudhon,  no  matter 
though  his  genius  may  have  been  erratic. 

It  was  not  only  to  Proudhon  that  The  Tribune  extended 
welcome.  Other  "isms"  received  fair  treatment.  Among 
them  the  proposed  reform  of  "  Woman's  Eights."  "Women's 
Conventions  have  come  to  be  quite  in  the  ordinary  way.  They 
are  among  the  common  occurrences  of  current  history;  and 
some  of  them  are  very  common  indeed.  But  there  was  a  time 
when  a  Woman's  Convention  was  a  new  thing  under  the  sun. 
There  had  to  be,  of  course,  the  first  Woman's  Convention. 
Of  this  Convention,  The  Tribune  gave  a  full  report,  and  treated 
it  throughout  with  respectful  consideration.  It  endorsed  with 
emphasis  the  principle  underlying  the  proposed  reform,  but 
did  not  become  an  advocate  of  the  measures  urged  by  the 
Women's  Eights  party.  It  said: 

"  It  is  easy  to  be  smart,  to  be  droll,  to  be  facetious,  in  opposition  to  the 
demands  of  these  Female  Reformers;  and,  in  decrying  assumptions  so 
novel  and  opposed  to  established  habits  and  usages,  a  little  wit  will  go  a 
great  way.  But  when  a  sincere  republican  is  asked  to  say  in  sober  earnest 
what  adequate  reason  he  can  give  for  refusing  the  demand  of  women  to 
an  equal  participation  with  men  in  political  rights,  he  must  answer,  None 
at  all.  True,  he  may  say  that  he  believes  it  unwise  in  them  to  make  the 
demand — he  may  say  the  great  majority  desire  no  such  thing ;  that  they 
prefer  to  devote  their  time  to  the  discharge  of  home  duties  and  the  enjoy- 
ment of  home  delights,  leaving  the  functions  of  legislators,  sheriffs,  jury- 
men,  militia,  to  their  fathers,  husbands,  brothers ;  yet  if,  after  all,  the  ques- 
tion recurs, '  But  suppose  the  women  should  generally  prefer  a  complete 
political  equality  with  men,  what  would  you  say  to  that  demand?' — the 
answer  must  be, '  I  accede  to  it.  However  unwise  or  mistaken  the  demand, 
it  is  but  the  assertion  of  a  natural  right,  and  as  such  must  be  con- 
ceded.' " 

It  was  a  great  deal  harder  to  say  this  when  it  was  said  than 
it  would  be  to  say  it  now.  We  shall  see,  before  the  conclusion 

*/ 

of  this  volume,  that  the  women  of  the  Women's  Eight  move- 
ment— with,  doubtless,  some  honourable  exceptions — returned 
Mr.  Greeley's  generous  welcome  with  ingratitude  more  cold- 
blooded, heartless,  and,  I  had  almost  said,  atrocious,  than,  we 


444  LIFE  OF  HORACE   GREELET. 

may  fervently  hope,  could  be  possible  with  those  usually  classed 
as  of  the  sterner  sex.  Nevertheless,  the  Woman's  Rights 
"  ism  "  was  debited  up  against  Mr.  Greeley,  during  the  whole 
period  of  its  almost  universal  unpopularity.  It  was  one  of 
those  distasteful  things  which  prepared  the  way  for  The  Times. 

During  all  the  years  Mr.  Greeley  was  Editor  thereof,  The 
Tribune  earnestly  advocated  Labour  reform.  It  was  not  more 
heartily  the  champion  of  amnesty  after  the  war  of  the  rebel- 
lion than  it  ever  was  the  friend  of  the  workingman.  Through 
the  elevation  of  the  labouring  classes  it  sought  the  welfare  of 
the  whole  people.  The  early  advocate  of  cooperation,  it  ex- 
tended welcome  to  trades'  unions,  and  to  every  well-considered 
effort  made  by  workingmen  for  their  improvement  and  advance- 
ment. Horace  Greeley  was  the  first  eminent  American  to  ad- 
vocate a  reduction  of  the  hours  of  labour.  He  admitted  the 
wisdom  of  strikes  in  very  many  instances.  He  manifested  his 
true  regard  for  workingmen  by  uttering  his  opinions  as  one  of 
themselves,  not  as  a  flattering,  fawning  demagogue.  When  he 
thought  they  were  making  a  mistake  in  a  strike  or  a  policy, 
he  told  them  so,  and  suggested  what  he  conceived  to  be  a  better 
remedy  for  the  ills  sought  to  be  cured  than  the  one  proposed. 
If  the  articles  in  The  Tribune  in  behalf  of  Labour  Reform 
were  published  in  a  volume,  it  would  be  one  of  large  size,  of 
many  prophetic  passages,  and  of  no  little  value  to  a  movement 
— shall  we  cull  it  a  revolution  ? — which  is  destined  to  mark  an 
early,  let  us  hope  the  next,  grand  step  forward  in  the  progress 
and  the  happiness  of  mankind. 

Moreover,  Horace  Greeley  enforced  the  idea  of  Association 
not  only  by  precept  but  by  example.  Only  a  few  years  after 
the  founding  of  the  paper,  Messrs.  Greeley  &  McElrath,  then 
making  handsome  profits  from  The  Tribune,  exhibited  the 
sincerity  of  their  belief  in  the  principle  for  the  emancipation 
of  Labour  which  their  journal  had  so  persistently  maintained, 
by  putting  it  into  practice  in  their  own  establishment.  The 
property  was  valued  at  one  hundred  thousand  dollars.  This 
was  divided  into  one  hundred  shares  of  one  thousand  dollars 
each,  of  which  Mr.  Greeley  and  Mr.  McElrath  retained  a 
majority,  selling  the  balance  to  regular  employe's  of  the  estab- 


ASSOCIATION.  445 

lishment.  Tims  several  gentlemen  of  the  editorial  corps,  the 
cashier,  the  foreman  of  the  composition-room,  and  the  fore- 
man of  the  press-rooms  became  joint-owners  with  the  original 
proprietors.  Speaking  of  this  venture  in  an  editorial  in  The 
Tribune  in  1851,  Mr.  Greeley  said: 

"  The  course  of  The  Tribune  is  still  onward.  Commenced  individually 
by  him  who  has  continued  to  be  its  chief  editor,  the  number  of  its  proprie- 
tors has  since  been  gradually  increased  to  twelve,  including  all  those 
responsibly  connected  with  its  conduct,  editorial,  financial,  or  mechanical. 
These  purpose  and  hope  in  time  to  make  still  further  application  of  the 
general  principle  that  the  workman  should  be  his  own  employer  and 
director,  and  should  receive  the  full  reward  of  his  labour.  The  quickened 
sense  of  responsibility,  and  the  more  thorough  devotion  of  mind  and 
muscle  to  the  appointed  work  which  this  system  induces,  will  be  found  to 
overbalance  any  incidental  disadvantages,  if  its  application  be  wisely 
made,  so  that  the  new  idea  and  the  old  habits  may  be  gradually  and  safely 
harmonized." 

| 

In  1867  The  Tribune  published  a  detailed  statement  of  its 
receipts  and  expenditures  for  the  years  1865  and  1866,  respect- 
ively. The  receipts  in  1865  were  $816,537.02,  the  expenditures 
$646,107.16,  making  receipts  over  expenditures  $170,429.86, 
or  nearly  twice  the  total  valuation  of  the  whole  property  when 
association  was  adopted.  In  the  following  year  the  receipts 
were  $909,417.89,  but  the  expenditures  were  correspondingly 
heavy,  amounting  to  $885,158.39,  leaving  a  profit  of  something 
more  than  $24,000.  During  this  year  The  Tribune  paid 
$418,199.62  for  printing  paper;  $86,609.14  for  type  setting; 
$81,775.40  for  editorial  services;  49,300.57  for  correspondence: 
$58,776.04  for  news  by  telegraph.  The  bills  for  ink  amounted 
to  nearly  $10,000,  and  the  United  States  tax  on  receipts  for 
advertisements  was  $10,082.19. 

"VVorkingmen,  printers  especially,  should  not  fail  to  bear  in 
mind  that  The  Tribune  Company  was  not  merely  a  joint  stock 
corporation.  It  was  more, — the  association  of  ownership  and 
labour.  Printers  were  given  the  opportunity  to  buy  shares, 
paying  therefor  in  work  at  the  regular  rates.  I  suppose  the 
stock  is  now  worth  from  five  hundred  to  one  thousand  per 
cent,  premium.  That  is,  a  printer  who  originally  bought  a 
ehare  in  The  Tribune,  paying  therefor  one  thousand  dollars, 


446  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

could  sell  it  for  from  five  to  ten  thousand.  If  he  owned  it  in 
1865,  his  dividend  thereon  was  about  seventeen  hundred 
dollars, — a  sura  which  he  made  in  addition  to  his  pay  in  the 
composition-room  or  the  press-room,  as  the  case  might  have 
been. 

But  this  is  not  all.  It  is  undoubtedly  the  fact  that  one  of 
the  most  valuable  inventions  ever  made  in  the  interest  of  great 
newspaper  establishments  was  the  process  of  stereotyping  the 
forms.  I  shall  speak,  or  rather  quote,  of  this  in  some  detail 
before  concluding  this  chapter.  Let  it  suffice  here  to  say  that 
the  invention  was  made  by  an  employe  of  The  Tribune,  working 
regularly  on  the  paper  for  years,  at  stated  wages,  and  who  was 
also  a  stockholder  in  the  concern.  Now  it  may  with  perfect 
safety  be  urged  that,  no  matter  how  skilful  and  careful  this 
foreman  might  have  been,  he  never  would  have  devoted  the 
long  time  and  hard  study  which  finally  resulted  in  a  great 
invention,  except  he  had  been  animated  by  the  desire  of 
increasing  the  value  of  his  own  property.  It  was  almost 
painful  to  him  to  see  the  types  smashed  by  the  ponderous 
press,  because  they  were,  in  part,  his  own.  His  wages  would 
have  been  the  same,  had  the  press  gone  on  forever  daily  ruin- 
ing many  types.  But  his  dividends  would  have  been  less.  So 
he  set  his  mind  to  work  in  their  behalf  and  won  a  handsome 
and  a  valuable  victory. 

Association  infuses  mental  into  manual  labour,  with  the 
result  of  increased  skill,  less  drudgery,  better  pay.  All  which 
and  more  the  history  ot  Horace  Greeley's  venture  in  The 
Tribune  Company  abundantly  shows. 

We  have  seen  that  Horace  Greeley  often  used  "  strong  lan- 
guage "  in  social  .converse  with  friends.  Perhaps  there  has 
been  no  period  in  the  history  of  The  Tribune  when  it  so  fre- 
quently dealt  in  "  the  energetic  idiom  "  as  about  the  time 
association  was  adopted.  It  is  only  just  to  say  that  Mr.  Greeley 
was  often  cruelly  misrepresented  and  maligned;  fairly  goaded 
into  overflowing  indignation.  No  man  who  ever  lived  cared 
less  for  opposition,  if  carried  on  with  truth  and  reasonable 
candour.  Indeed,  we  have  already  seen,  that  he  rather  liked 
to  be  opposed,  and  had  little  sympathy  for  "thin  skins." 


STRONG   LANGUAGE.  447 

About  the  time  of  which  we  speak,  however,  his  own  life  was 
BO  often  and  so  grossly  libelled;  his  opinions,  which  he  sincerely 
believed  were  calculated  to  promote  the  welfare  of  the  people, 
were  so  constantly,  and  as  he  felt,  so  wilfully  and  greatly  mis- 
represented, that  it  is  no  wonder  The  Tribune  was  frequently 
more  vituperative  and  abusive  than  is  consistent  with  good 
taste  or  effective  argumentation.  We  sometimes  say  a  man 
uses  strong  language  when  but  for  our  chivalric  politeness  we 
should  say  he  has  a  vulgar  vocabulary.  If  The  Tribune  occa- 
sionally showed  that  its  vocabulary  was  unlimited,  as  well  in 
the  low  as  the  high  notes,  we  should  be  culpably  unjust  not  to 
consider  the  provocation.  And  we  have  the  authority  of  so 
fine  a  gentleman  as  Sir  Walter  Scott  for  the  statement,  that 
when  one  is  persistently  abused  by  a  blackguard  one  may  put 
an  end  to  the  business  by  knocking  him  down.  Many  who 
assailed  Mr.  Greeley  were  gentlemen :  many  who  assailed  him 
were  gentlemen  with  some  ungentlemanly  habits;  others,  in  a 
spirit  of  the  loftiest  courtesy,  in  which  there  is  so  often  some- 
thing of  irony,  I  will  call  gentlemen.  To  the  attacks  of  all  he 
replied  with  manly  vigour,  and  if  he  now  and  then  weakened 
the  force  of  his  reply  by  indecorous  language,  we  may  perceive 
that  here  was  "  poverty  of  the  manly  American  sort,"  sure  not 
to  last  long.  Besides,  he  could  hardly  have  been  an  American 
citizen,  taking  an  active  part  in  politics,  without  both  giving 
and  receiving  blows  which  never  should  have  been  dealt  at  all. 
Take  off  the  cream  of  high-toned  discussion  from  the  conduct 
of  American  politics,  and  what  a  dish  of  unpalatable  skim-milk 
would  be  left!  And  the  measurement  would  not  have  been 
perceptibly  decreased  by  the  removal  of  the  cream,  either. 
The  American  characteristic  of  exaggeration, — our  apparently 
irrepressible  tendency  to  hyperbole,  —  finds  expression,  in 
politics,  in  abuse.  It  is  matter  of  regret  that  The  New-York 
Tribune  so  ably  maintained  a  national  characteristic  which  is 
not  at  all  creditable, — at  least  in  the  development  of  it  of 
which  we  speak, — to  our  nationality;  but,  because  it  is  a 
national  trait,  our  condemnation  of  it  in  any  particular  instance 
should  be  made  more  in  sorrow  than  in  anger. 

One  need  not  to  reason  long  in  concluding  that  the  journal 


448  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

founded  in  1841,  the  proprietor  starting  with  about  a  thousand 
dollars  capital,  which  before  the  close  of  the  decade  was  worth 
$100,000  in  cash,  must  meantime  have  grown  into  an  estab- 
lishment of  vast  proportions  and  extensive  and  varied  capacities. 
Mr.  A.  J.  Curnmings  contributed  a  series  of  articles  to 
Packard's  Monthly  magazine  in  1868-69,  upon  the  subject 
"  How  Newspapers  are  made,"  which  gave  a  full  description 
of  The  Tribune  establishment  at  that  time,  with  sketches  of 
Mr.  Greeley  and  other  editors.  The  articles  were  so  happily 
conceived  and  so  graphically  written,  and  upon  a  topic  too,  ot 
such  general  interest,  that  they  had  "  the  run  of  the  press  " 
pretty  generally.  Nevertheless,  I  think  I  could  not  do  a  more 
acceptable  service  to  my  readers  than  by  reproducing  much  of 
what  Mr.  Cummings  then  wrote;  for  I  am  perfectly  certain  it 
would  be  next  to  impossible  for  any  one  to  give  a  more  accu- 
rate or  more  lively  description  of  the  editorial,  the  mechanical, 
and  the  business  operations  of  the  office.  Mr.  S.  S.  Packard, 
the  editor  and  publisher  of  the  magazine  in  question,  having 
most  kindly  given  me  leave  to  make  such  use  of  that  periodical 
as  might  aid  me  in  this  work,1  I  quote  extensively  from  Mr. 
Cummings's  graphic  sketches: 

An  immense  dry-goods  box,  surmounted  by  a  flag-staff,  and  dotted  wit'u 
windows,  stands  on  the  corner  of  Spruce  and  Nassau  streets.  This,  so  A 
sign  informs  us,  is  The  Tribune  Building.  The  edifice  itself  is  nothing 
but  a  mass  of  dirty -faced  bricks  piled  along  Printing-House  Square.  The 
Tribune  purchased,  last  year,  the  adjoining  property  on  Nassau  street,  but 
cannot  improve  it  till  the  expiration  of  a  lease,  when  it  will  erect  a  suita- 
ble building  on  the  two  lots.  Standing  on  the  curb  of  the  Park,  opposite 

i  In  reply  to  a  note  that  I  addressed  to  Mr.  Packard,  inquiring  upon  what 
terms  I  might  make  use  of  this  interesting  matter,  I  promptly  received  the 
following: 

"  PACKARD'S  BUSINESS  COLLZQI, 
"No.  805,  Broadway,  New-York,  March  25, 187S. 
"Mr  DBAS  SIR:— 

"Tour  favour  is  at  hand.    You  have  my  free  permission  to  use  anything  in 
Packard's  Monthly  which  will  aid  you  in  your  work.    *    * 

Yours  truly,  "  S.  S.  PACKARD. 

u  L.  D.  INQBBSOLL,  Esq." 

I  here  publicly  acknowledge  grateful  thanks  for  the  portion  of  this  work 
which,  I  cannot  but  think,  will  be  more  interesting  than  any  other  to  my 
fellow-printers,  and  highly  instructive  to  all  general  reader*. 


TRLBUNE  BUILDINGS. 

old  Tammany  Hall,  and  casting  your  eyes  to  the  right,  surveying  a  portion 
of  The  Herald's  palatial  marble  front,  the  skeleton  mass  of  red  sand-stone 
called  The  Express  office,  and  the  architectural  piles  of  Nova  Scotia  granite 
and  brown  stone  inclosing  The  "World  and  Times  establishments,  The 
Tribune  seems  like  a  small  potato,  indeed,  and  its  size  diminishes  as  the 
eye  roams  to  the  left,  taking  in  The  Sun  office,  snugly  ensconced  with 
Brick  Pomeroy's  Democrat  beneath  a  Mansard  roof,  and  the  stately  marble 
faces  of  The  Staats  Zeitung  and  The  News.  The  Herald  building  is  an 
architectural  fop,  with  a  cancan  collar  and  a  dress-coat,  The  Express  office 
is  a  quasi-shabby  ticket  speculator,  The  World  establishment  is  a  nobby 
broker,  The  Times  edifice  is  a  white-chokered  city  clergyman,  The  Sun 
front  is  a  Tammany  politician  clad  in  second-hand  garments,  The  Staats 
Zeitung  is  a  dapper  little  bald-headed  Dutchman,  The  News  is  a  broken 
down  scion  of  Southern  chivalry,  clothed  in  white  linen  and  wearing  a 
Panama  hat,  while  The  Tribune  pile  resembles  a  country  fanner,  with 
patched  pants,  slouched  hat,  loose  suspenders,  and  a  dirty  shirt. 

Carefully  surveying  the  front  of  the  building  from  the  street,  its  sign 
alone  attracts  attention.    There  it  is — 


TRIBUNE. 


in  big  block  letters,  each  eight  feet  long,  glaring  at  you  day  and  night, 
from  a  roof  covering  five  stories  and  a  double  basement,  and  there  it  has 
stood  twenty-three  years,  staring  at  excited  crowds  on  election  nights, 
gazing  at  gangs  of  infuriated  rioters,  looking  down  upon  the  funeral  pro- 
cessions of  Lincoln,  Ellsworth,  Sedgwick,  Clay,  and  other  distinguished 
dead  patriots,  smiling  at  the  parade  in  honour  of  the  Prince  of  Wales, 
frowning  at  the  attempted  coup  d'etat  of  Fernando  Wood,  laughing  at  the 
great  cable  celebration  of  1858,  exulting  in  the  joyful  outpourings  of  the 
people  in  honour  of  Union  victories,  dancing  in  the  atmosphere  of  the 
great  Republican  torchlight  procession  preceding  President  Lincoln's 
first  election,  lighted  up  with  the  illumination  of  the  City  Hall  on  the 
stormy  night  following  the  news  of  the  capture  of  Fort  Donelson,  and 
observing  a  hundred  similar  events  chronicled  on  the  page  of  our  city's 
history.  The  flickering  light  of  a  thousand  metropolitan  fires,  destroying 
millions  of  property,  has  danced  over  the  faces  of  these  ten  gilt  letters. 
During  the  three  nights  of  the  draft  riots  they  were  never  shrouded  in 
darkness.  Through  storm  and  sunshine,  Union  victories  and  Rebel  tri- 
umphs, the  old  sign  has  stood  as  firm  as  the  journal  which  it  represents.  Of 
the  twenty-six  newspaper  signs  within  our  range  of  vision,  The  Tribune 
sign  is  the  most  conspicuous. 

We  stand  opposite  the  office,  near  the  gate  entering  the  Park.  From 
this  spot,  when  in  his  sanctum,  Mr.  Greeley  can  easily  be  seen.  Hundreds 
of  persons  pass  here  every  evening  without  imagining  the  white-headed 
man  seen  through  the  fourth  and  fifth  windows,  second  story,  from  the 
comer  of  Spruce  street,  to  be  Mr.  Greeley.  Yet  there  he  is  in  his  editorial 

29 


450  LITE  OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

nest  nearly  every  afternoon  and  evening,  seated  at  his  desk,  his  fingers 
nervously  dancing  over  thin  sheets  of  foolscap  within  four  inches  of  his 
nose,  and  his  white  head  and  broad  forehead  made  especially  conspicuous 
by  the  carefully  shaded  gas-light  above.  Here  he  works  in  a  gold  mine 
that  his  own  natural  talents,  indomitable  energy,  and  unflagging  industry 
have  created.  And  yet  there  must  be  a  screw  loose  somewhere,  for  while 
fifty  men  have  made  fortunes  out  of  The  Tribune,  Horace  Greeley,  with  all 
the  attention  given  to  outside  literary  pursuits,  is  comparatively  a  poor 
man.  Ever  ready  to  help  the  needy  and  destitute,  ever  easy  of  access,  his 
better  judgment  is  hourly  drowned  by  his  sympathies. 

There  are  twenty  windows  in  front  of  The  Tribune  office.  Some  of  them 
have  histories.  During  the  riots  of  1863  a  brass  Dahlgren  was  masked 
behind  the  sashes  of  the  corner  window  on  the  second  story,  and  if  the 
Rebel  mob  had  made  a  second  attempt  upon  the  building,  a  death-dealing 
stream  of  hubs  and  old  spikes  would  have  issued  from  the  mouth  of  that 
gun.  The  fifth  window  from  the  right  in  the  fourth  story,  now  an  eye  of 
the  room  occupied  by  John  Russell  Young,  faced  for  many  years  the 
favourite  corner  of  Wm.  Henry  Fry.  Here,  while  wasting  away  beneath 
the  insidious  approaches  of  a  pulmonic  disease,  poor  Fry  would  sit  by  the 
hour,  and  gaze  at  the  horse-cars,  carts,  and  omnibusses  crawling  along  the 
street  below,  and  write  those  musical  criticisms  so  peculiarly  abstruse,  or 
scratch  off  a  political  editorial,  jointed  with  rivets  of  original  sarcasm. 
Take  the  second  and  third  windows,  fourth  story,  from  the  corner  of  Spruce 
street.  Between  these  sashes  Mr.  George  Ripley  has  written  the  Book 
Reviews  of  The  Tribune  for  a  score  of  years.  In  former  days  he  invaria- 
bly opened  the  window  on  his  right  to  learn  the  time  from  the  City  Hall 
clock,  but,  time  has  dimmed  his  spectacles,  and  he  has  been  compelled  to 
purchase  a  watch.  And  clear  up  there  in  the  corner,  on  the  top  floor,  Old 
Dodge,  or  "Antiquated  Heathen,"  as  his  comrades  call  him  — he  is  a  stiff 
infidel,  and  takes  the  Boston  Investigator — has  stuck  type  for  a  living  over 
twenty-five  years.  A  revolver  was  fired  at  the  mob  from  that  corner  win- 
dow on  the  evening  of  July  14,  1863,  by  one  of  the  four  plucky  type-setters 
who  barricaded  the  door  of  the  composing  room,  and  determined  to  hurl 
iron  "  shooting-sticks,"  lead  "  side-sticks,"  fifty-pound  "  turtles,"  and  sim- 
ilar printing  material,  on  the  heads  of  the  riotors,  in  case  they  attempted 
to  force  a  passage  up  the  winding  iron  stairs.  The  row  of  windows  on  the 
editorial  floor  all  have  a  warlike  history.  During  the  riots  thirty-pound 
ahells  were  sent  to  the  office  from  the  Brooklyn  Navy  Yard,  and  five  troughs, 
ten  feet  long,  were  furnished,  with  the  intention  of  running  them  out  from 
those  very  windows,  and  of  rolling  the  shells  down  upon  the  heads  of  the 
mob  in  the  street  below.  The  result  would  have  been  that  the  whole  front 
of  the  building  would  have  been  demolished,  and  the  warlike  editors 
would  have  sustained  more  injury  than  the  riotors.  Every  brick  in  the 
whole  building  seems  to  have  its  own  peculiar  history.  Even  the  pave- 
ment sleeping  in  front  of  the  counting-room  has  its  story  to  tell,  for  dead 
men  dropped  on  the  flagging  during  that  memorable  evening,  and  barri- 
cades of  printing-paper,  four  feet  thick,  arose  thereon  before  daylight. 


THE   COUNTING-ROOM.  451 

We  have  seen  the  shell.  Now  let  us  look  at  the  kernel.  Crossing  the 
street,  we  enter  one  of  the  four  doors  to  the  counting-room.  The  ceiling 
is  not  high,  but  the  room  is  decently  ventilated.  A  short  counter,  ending 
on  the  left  in  a  little  gate,  and  flanked  by  cash  and  mail  desks,  confronts 
us.  Here  are  two  dozen  clerks,  all  busy  as  bees,  opening  letters,  counting 
money,  registering  advertisements,  receiving  subscriptions,  writing  wrap- 
pers, mailing  odd  copies  of  the  paper,  and  attending  to  twenty  other  similar 
duties.  Engravings  of  Horace  Greeley  hang  on  the  walls,  and  two  or 
three  dusty  busts  of  Lincoln  stand  in  the  corners  of  the  room.  Ste*p  to  the 
counter.  A  white  face,  set  with  two  mild  blue  eyes  and  fringed  with  hair 
inclining  to  a  rolling  curl,  salutes  us.  This  is  Mr.  George  King,  a  clerk  in 
the  office  over  twenty  years,  and  still  working  faithfully  in  the  harness. 

"  Is  Mr.  Greeley  in,  sir  ?  " 

King  glances  at  us  very  sharply,  as  if  suspicious  that  we  are  political 
vermin,  sent  to  worry  Horace  Greeley  into  the  support  of  some  worthless 
office-seeker  —  then  looks  at  the  clock  in  his  rear,  and  after  a  squint  at  a 
half-open  door  on  his  right,  answers : 

"Twenty  minutes  past  four"  —  slapping  his  hands  on  the  counter  — 
"the  'Old  Man's'  here!" 

"Can  we  see  him?" 

Another  sharp  scrutiny,  and  the  words  fly  back : 

"  In  one  moment,  gentlemen.    At  present  he  is  engaged." 

A  dark-complexioned  gentleman,  with  a  snapping  pair  of  black  eyes,  is 
busy  at  a  desk  on  our  right,  scheduling  advertisements  and  marking  down 
subscriptions  for  the  "Weekly  and  Campaign  Tribunes.  This  is  Mr.  Barker, 
one  of  the  old  stand-byes.  From  him  we  learn  that  50,000  Campaign 
Tribunes  are  being  sent  to  Pennsylvania,  20,000  to  New  Jersey,  over  100,000 
in  New  York,  and  300,000  to  the  West.  While  we  are  annoying  Barker, 
an  old  man  with  thin  straggling  gray  hair,  and  with  two  sharp  gray  eyes 
flashing  through  a  pair  of  eye-glasses,  rushes  in  the  door,  and  darts 
through  the  little  gate  in  the  counter.  In  his  hand  is  a  bundle  of  checks 
and  greenbacks.  This  is  Mr.  Jenny,  the  collector  of  the  office.  He  looks 
as  if  he  had  scraped  barnacles  from  the  keel  of  Noah's  ark.  He  is  fre- 
quently mistaken  by  awe-stricken  countrymen  for  Mr.  Greeley  himself. 
There  is  pluck  in  this  old  fellow.  He  was  the  only  man  who  faced  the 
riotors  when  a  storm  of  brickbats  flew  through  the  counting-room  win- 
dows. He  struck  boldly  out  from  his  shoulder  when  the  mob  rushed 
through  the  doors.  Of  course  he  was  upset,  but  he  only  yielded  when 
overpowered  by  numbers.  The  ferocious  gang  were  too  intent  on  plunder 
to  visit  him  with  their  vengeance,  or  the  old  man's  life  would  have  paid 
forfeit  to  his  courage.  And  near  him  is  the  little  sharp-eyed  Gerow,  the 
cashier  of  the  establishment,  who  seems  as  cross  as  an  old  thorough-bred 
rat  terrier ;  but  he  has  a  good  heart,  and  receives  and  disburses  the  money 
of  The  Tribune  without  ever  making  a  blunder.  Old  Gen.  Watson,  gray 
as  a  badger,  is  pouring  over  the  mail  books  at  the  back  end  of  the  count- 
ing-room. These  men  have  held  their  present  positions  for  a  score  of 
years. 


4:52  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GREELEY. 

"  Go  right  up  stairs  now,  gentlemen.  Mr.  Greeley's  there  alone  now!" 
says  King. 

We  walk  through  the  little  gate  in  the  counter,  turn  within  the  open 
door  way  on  our  left,  climb  a  short  narrow  flight  of  stairs,  and  find  our- 
selves in  a  small  room,  ten  by  fifteen,  furnished  with  a  green  carpet,  a  bed 
lounge,  an  open  book-rack,  a  high  desk,  a  writing  desk,  three  arm  chairs, 
a  short-legged  table,  and  a  small  marble  sink. 

Mr.  Greeley's  back  is  toward  us.  He  is  seated  at  his  desk.  His  head  is 
bent  over  his  writing,  and  his  round  shoulders  are  quite  prominent.  He  is 
scribbling  rapidly.  A  quire  of  foolscap,  occupying  the  only  clear  space 
on  his  desk,  is  melting  beneath  his  pen.  A  glance  at  the  manuscript 
reveals  two  dozen  knotty  figures.  You  may  be  sure  of  a  leader  on  the 
National  Debt  to-morrow  morning.  The  desk  itself  is  a  heap  of  confu- 
sion. Here  is  Mr.  Greeley's  straw  hat;  there  is  his  handkerchief.  In 
front  of  him  is  a  peck  of  newspaper  clippings,  not  neatly  rolled  up,  but 
loosely  sprawled  over  the  desk.  At  his  left  a  rickety  pair  of  scissors 
catches  a  hurried  nap,  and  at  his  right  a  paste-pot  and  a  half-broken  box 
of  wafers  appear  to  have  had  a  rough-and-tumble  fight.  An  old-looking 
paper-holder  is  just  ready  to  tumble  on  the  floor.  An  old  fashioned  sand- 
box, looking  like  a  dilapidated  hour-glass,  is  half  hidden  under  a  slashed 
copy  of  The  New- York  "World.  Mr.  Greeley  still  sticks  to  wafers  and 
sand,  instead  of  using  mucilage  and  blotting-paper.  A  small  drawer,  filled 
with  postage  stamps  and  bright  steel  pens,  has  crawled  out  on  the  desk. 
Packages  of  folded  missives  are  tucked  in  the  pigeon-holes  winking  at  us 
from  the  back  of  the  desk,  and  scores  of  half-opened  letters,  mixed  with 
seedy  brown  envelopes,  flop  lazily  about  the  table.  Old  papers  —  The 
Charleston  Mercury,  The  New  Orleans  Republican  and  Crescent,  The  St. 
Louis  Democrat,  and  Republican,  The  Richmond  Whig,  and  Inquirer,  The 
Rocky  Mountain  News,  The  Albany  Journal,  The  Philadelphia  Post,  The 
Sacramento  Union,  The  London  Times,  The  Portland  Oregonian,  The  Free- 
Traders'  Journal,  The  Spectator,  The  Augusta  Chronicle,  The  Cincinnati 
Commercial,  and  Gazette,  The  Chicago  Post,  and  Republican,  The  London 
Daily  News,  The  Hawaiian  Gazette,  The  Athenseum,  The  Detroit  Post, 
The  Mobile  Register,  The  London  Telegraph,  The  Boston  Post  (Henry 
Wilson  carried  off  The  Advertiser),  The  New- York  Express,  Post,  Com- 
mercial, Mail,  and  twenty  other  papers — lay  gashed  and  mangled  about  his 
chair,  the  debris  of  a  literary  battle-field.  A  clean  towel  hangs  on  a  rack 
to  his  right.  A  bound  copy  of  The  Tribune  Almanac,  from  1838  to  1868, 
swings  from  a  small  chain  fastened  to  a  staple  screwed  in  the  side  of  his 
desk,  two  other  bound  volumes  stand  on  their  feet  in  front  of  his  nose,  and 
two  more  of  the  same  kind  are  fast  asleep  on  the  book-rack  in  the  corner. 
Stray  numbers  of  the  Almanac  peep  from  every  nook.  The  man  who 
would  carry  off  Greeley's  bound  pile  of  almanacs  would  deserve  capital 
punishment.  The  Philosopher  could  better  afford  to  lose  one  of  his  legs 
than  to  lose  his  almanacs.  The  room  is  kept  scrupulously  clean  and  neat 
A  waste-paper  basket  squats  between  Mr.  Greeley's  legs,  but  one-half  the 
torn  envelopes  and  boshy  communications  flutter  to  the  floor  instead  of 


MR.    GKEELEY   AT   WORK.  453 

being  tossed  into  the  basket.  The  table  at  his  side  is  covered  with  a  stray 
copy  of  The  New-York  Ledger.  Packard's  Monthly  and  a  dozen  other 
magazines  lay  thereon.  Here  is  an  iron  garden-rake  wrapped  up  in  an 
Independent.  There  hangs  a  pair  of  hand-cuffs  once  worn  by  Old  John 
Brown,  and  sent  Mr.  Greeley  by  an  enthusiastic  admirer  of  both  Horace 
and  John.  A  champagne  basket,  filled  with  old  scrap-books  and  pamphlets, 
occupies  one  corner.  A  dirty  bust  of  Lincoln,  half  hidden  in  dusty  piles 
of  paper,  struggles  to  be  seen  on  the  top  of  his  desk.  A  pile  of  election 
tables,  dirty,  ragged  and  torn,  clipped  from  some  unknoAvn  newspaper,  look 
as  if  they  had  half  a  mind  to  jump  down  on  the  "  Old  Man's  "  bald  head. 
A  certificate  of  life  membership  in  some  Tract  or  Abolition  Society,  and 
maps  of  the  World,  New  York,  and  New  Jersey  hang  on  the  wall.  A  rare 
geological  specimen  of  quartz  rock,  weighing  about  ten  pounds,  is  ready 
to  roll  down  a  high  desk  to  the  floor  on  the  first  alarm.  Dirty  pamphlets 
are  as  plentiful  as  cock-roaches.  Let  us  look  at  his  office  library.  Here 
are  150  volumes.  First  we  see  five  large  volumes  of  "  The  Statesman's 
Manual,"  then  six  volumes  of  "  The  Life  of  Clay."  Here  are  the  lives  of 
Lincoln,  Franklin,  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  A.  P.  Dostie,  Memoirs  of  Margaret 
Fuller,  and — no,  surely,  it  cannot  be!  the  "Life  of  Horace  Greeley!" 
"McPherson's  Political  Manual  "  and  a  volume  of  "  Mrs.  Hemans'  Poems  " 
are  hugging  each  other.  Lanman's  "  Dictionary  of  Congress  "  is  edging 
away  from  Carey's  "  Social  Science."  Plato's  "  Immortality  of  the  Soul  " 
is  nip  and  tuck  with  the  "  Transactions  of  the  American  Wool  Associa- 
tion." Perry's  "Elements  of  Political  Economy"  is  courting  Dickens's 
"  Mutual  Friend."  A  volume  of  the  Speeches  of  Alexander  H.  Stephens 
is  making  faces  at  Henry  Wilson's  "  Anti-Slavery  Measures  in  Congress." 
An  old  volume  of  Washington  Irving's  "  Spanish  Papers  "  is  sandwiched 
between  the  "  Handbook  of  Cotton  Manufacture  "  and  Seaman's  "  Pro- 
gress of  Nations."  A  "  History  of  Londonderry  "  is  studying  the  "  Trial 
of  Surratt."  "  Youatt  on  the  Horse  "  and  Helper's  "Nojoque"  laugh  at 
each  other  over  a  "  History  of  the  Whig  Party."  Three  "  Gospel  Litur- 
gies "  lay  next  to  a  half  dozen  "  Reports  on  the  Conduct  of  the  War." 
A  work  on  "  Botanical  Reports "  kisses  a  copy  of  "  The  Federalist." 
"Allibone's  History  of  Authors"  is  nearly  smothered  under  a  pile  of 
"  Census  Reports."  Volumes  of  Diplomatic  Correspondence,  State  and 
Convention  Manuals,  Agricultural  Reports,  and  scores  of  books  on  the 
National  Debt  and  the  Tariff,  hold  their  own  on  various  shelves. 

Mr.  Greeley  can  lay  Virginia  worm  fences  in  ink  faster  than  any  other 
editor  in  New- York  city.  He  uses  a  fountain-pen,  a  present  from  some 
friend.  He  thinks  a  great  deal  of  it,  but  during  an  experience  of  three 
years  has  failed  to  learn  the  simple  principle  of  suction  without  getting 
his  mouth  full  of  ink,  and  he  generally  uses  it  with  an  empty  receiver 
He  makes  a  dash  at  the  ink-bottle  every  twenty  seconds,  places  the  third 
finger  and  thumb  of  his  left  hand  on  his  paper,  and  scratches  away  at  hia 
worm  fences  like  one  possessed.  He  writes  marvelously  fast.  Frequently 
the  point  of  his  pen  pricks  through  his  sheet,  for  he  writes  a  heavy  hand, 
and  a  snap  follows,  spreading  inky  spots  over  the  paper,  resembling  a 


454  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

•wood-cut  portraying  the  sparks  from  a  blacksmith's  hammer.  Blots  like 
mashed  spiders  or  crushed  huckleberries  occasionally  intervene,  but  the 
old  veteran  dashes  them  with  sand,  leaving  a  swearing  compositor  to 
scratch  off  the  soil,  and  dig  out  the  words  underneath. 

Mr.  Greeley's  manuscript,  when  seen  for  the  first  time,  resembles  an  intri- 
cate mass  of  lunatic  hieroglyphics,  or  the  tracks  of  a  spider  suffering  from 
delirium  tremens.  But,  by  those  accustomed  to  his  writing,  a  remarkable 
exactness  is  observed.  The  spelling,  punctuation,  accented  letters,  and 
capitalizing  are  perfect.  The  old  type-setters  of  the  office  prefer  his  mail 
uscript  above  that  of  any  other  Editor,  for  the  simple  reason  that  he  writes 
his  article  as  he  wishes  it  to  appear,  and  rarely,  if  ever,  cuts  or  slashes  a 
proof-sheet.  And  this  punctuality  is,  in  a  great  measure,  a  feature  of  his 
life.  He  is  always  on  time,  and  never  waits  for  anybody.  He  employs  no 
Private  Secretary,  and  when  he  receives  a  letter,  answers  it  on  the  instant. 
No  matter  how  trival  the  request,  the  next  outward-bound  mail  will  carry 
away  one  of  his  autographs,  if  he  thinks  an  answer  necessary. 

He  knows  we  have  entered  his  room,  yet  he  continues  his  writing.  The 
only  sound  we  hear  within  the  sanctum  is  the  scratching  of  his  pen.  He  has 
the  power  of  concentrating  all  the  strength  of  his  mind  on  the  subject  of 
his  editorial,  and  will  pay  no  attention  to  any  question,  however  import- 
ant, until  he  finishes  his  sentence.  If  the  cry  of  "Fire!"  should  resound 
through  the  building,  Greeley  would  finish  his  sentence  and  ring  his  bell 
before  he  would  leave  his  room.  The  sentence  complete,  he  places  the 
forefinger  of  his  right  hand  at  the  end  of  the  word  last  written,  seizes  the 
handle  of  his  pen  in  his  teeth,  and  looks  his  tormentor  full  in  the  face.  It 
is  a  glance  of  inquiry,  and  the  questioner,  intuitively  conscious  of  this 
fact,  repeats  his  interrogation.  Mr.  Greeley  divines  the  question  before  it 
is  finished,  and  answers  it  pithily  and  quickly.  The  pen  is  then  snatched 
from  his  mouth,  dexterously  dipped  into  his  inkstand,  and  his  fingers 
again  travel  across  his  transverse  sheet  of  foolscap  like  a  "  daddy  long, 
legs  "  caught  in  a  storm.  If  his  questioner  is  importunate,  and  insists  on 
wasting  his  time,  he  continues  his  writing,  never  looking  up,  and  either 
answers  absent-mindedly,  or  in  a  low,  impatient  tone,  tinged  with  a  pecu- 
liar boyish  nervousness.  If  his  visitor  is  ungentlemanly  enough  to  still 
continue  his  teasing  importunities,  a  storm  breaks  forth,  and  the  uncour- 
teous  person  will  trot  out  of  the  sanctum  with  an  answer  ringing  in  his 
ears  that  should  bring  a  flush  to  his  cheek. 

The  popular  impression  of  Mr.  Greeley's  personal  appearance  seems  to 
be  associated  with  a  white  hat  and  a  white  overcoat,  and  with  one  leg  of 
his  pantaloons  hitched  on  the  top  of  his  boot-leg.  This  is  incorrect.  He 
is  clean  in  his  attire  —  never  wears  a  dirty  shirt  or  a  dirty  collar,  has  a  straw 
hat,  a  thin  black  frock  coat,  a  white  vest,  and  a  pair  of  black  doeskin 
pants  drawn  down  over  his  boot-tops.  Sometimes  he  wears  shoes,  and  he 
has  been  seen  with  leggings.  In  muddy  weather  his  boots  and  pants  may 
be  covered  with  dirt,  but  in  pleasant  days  they  are  clean  far  above  the 
average.  The  only  mark  of  slovenliness  about  him  centres  in  his  black 
silk  cravat,  which  will  occasionally  have  a  fight  with  his  collar,  and  a  slip 


TRIBUNE   EDITORIAL   ROOMS.  45S 

out  of  sight.  Sometimes  the  necktie  will  hold  its  own  with  the  collar,  but 
the  knot  will  jump  round  to  the  side  of  his  chin  and  give  him  a  remarkable 
air  of  absent-mindedness.  The  cause  of  this  irregularity  is  his  want  of 
skill  in  using  pins.  They  bend  and  prick  his  neck  until  he  is  glad  to 
drop  them. 

Mr.  Greeley  is  five  feet  ten  and  a  half  inches  in  height,  and  well  propor- 
tioned. He  is  fifty-seven  years  old.  He  is  partly  bald,  has  white  (not 
gray)  hair,  a  light  complexion,  small  sunken  blue  eyes,  a  well-shaped 
mouth,  and  regular  features.  A  white  beard  runs  over  his  throat  and 
flanks  his  chin,  like  a  tiny  chevaux-de-frise.  His  hands  are  small,  and  soft 
as  those  of  a  woman.  His  teeth  are  white  and  regular,  and,  in  talking,  are 
always  observable.  His  feet  are  large  and  ill  shaped.  You  can  hardly 
say  that  he  walks.  He  shuffles.  The  head  makes  a  motion  forward,  the 
body  follows  it,  as  if  swung  on  a  pair  of  hinges  at  the  hips,  the  legs  then 
move,  and  the  feet  straggle  out  as  if  undecided  whether  to  walk  or  to  keep 
still.  The  fact  of  the  business  is,  Horace  never  had  time  to  learn  to  walk. 
He  weighs  a  man  for  what  he  is  worth,  and  not  for  what  he  appears  to  be 
worth. 

"  Mr.  Greeley,  my  friend,  Mr. ,  who  has  called  to  pay  his  respects." 

Down  goes  the  forefinger  on  his  manuscript.  The  paper-holder  quiver- 
ing on  the  edge  of  his  desk  drops  to  the  floor.  You  catch  the  glow  of  his 
smiling  face,  a  glance  of  his  small  blue  eyes,  hear  his  shrill  treble  voice 
roll  off  a  few  pleasant  words,  and  we  descend  the  stairs  to  the  counting, 
room,  leaving  him  to  hack  away  at  blighting  human  wrongs  and  follies 
in  his  own  peculiar  manner.  *  * 

And  now  for  the  editorial  rooms.  Out  of  the  counting-room,  and  down 
Spruce  street  to  the  first  iron  stoop.  Up  a  pair  of  winding  iron  stairs  to 
the  fourth  story.  Here  is  an  iron  door,  painted  in  three  colors,  bearing 
the  following  inscription : 


EDITORIAL  ROOMS  OF  THE  TRIBUNE. 
RING  THE  BELL! 


Abraham  Lincoln  has  clicked  this  bell-spring.  Thackeray  has  peered 
through  this  netted  grating.  John  Brown  has  leaned  against  this  door- 
post. Kossuth  has  paired  his  finger-nails  in  this  entry.  Jenny  Lind  has 
drawn  a  silk  skirt  over  this  floor;  and  Henry  Clay's  silvery  voice  has 
floated  about  this  circular  iron  corridor.  The  feet  of  scores  of  distin- 
guished dead  have  trodden  these  metal  stairs. 

Here  we  are  at  the  door  of  the  editorial  room.  Step  within  this  little 
entry,  and  snap  a  small  spring  fitted  into  the  side  of  the  door-casing. 
Before  the  distant  tinkle  of  the  bell  dies  away,  little  Johnny  Weinheimer, 
the  office  boy,  opens  the  door,  and  throws  a  suspicious  glance  at  us  from 
his  black  eyes.  We  are  in  the  City  Editor's  room.  The  walls  are  covered 
with  maps.  A  perpendicular  viaduct,  for  communication  between  the 
counting,  editorial,  and  composing-rooms,  with  speaking-pipes,  copy-boxeg 


456  LIFE  OF  HORACE  QEEKLET. 

and  bells,  runs  from  the  low  ceiling  through  the  centre  of  the  room,  like 
the  succulent  branch  of  a  banyan  tree.  A  small  library  of  books  relating 
to  city  affairs  leans  against  the  viaduct.  A  water-pail  and  a  tin  jar  of  ice- 
water  occupies  one  corner  of  the  room.  Paste-pots  and  inkstands  are 
scattered  over  the  desks  in  lazy  confusion.  Bits  of  blotting-paper  and 
scores  of  rusty-looking  steel  pens  are  strewn  about  the  tables.  A  dozen 
reporters  are  seated  at  a  dozen  small  green  desks.  Some  are  writing,  a 
few  are  reading,  and  two  are  smoking  briarwood  pipes.  The  most  con- 
spicuous  reporter  in  the  room  is  Col.  James  B.  Mix,  a  man  of  magnificent 
physique,  and  a  genuine  Broadway  lounger.  He  is  dressed  in  exquisite 
taste,  wears  eye-glasses,  black  side-whiskers,  and  a  mustache,  and  has  a 
countenance  that  would  create  a  sensation  at  a  Sorosis  dinner.  The 
Colonel  was  formerly  a  private  in  the  Seventh  Regiment,  N.  G.,  went 
into  the  army,  and  soon  became  Captain  of  President  Lincoln's  Body-Guard. 
He  dined  Ute-d-t/te  with  his  Excellency  every  morning  for  nearly  a  year. 
Carpenter's  book  can't  begin  with  Colonel  Mix  in  reminiscences  of  Abraham 
Lincoln.  He  is  retailing  his  experiences  during  the  Yacht-Club  excursion 
to  a  small  but  stout-built  man,  with  a  rosy  face  and  intelligent  gray  eyes. 
This  is  Mr.  Barclay  Gallagher,  the  Assistant  City  Editor.  He  has  risen  to 
his  present  position  from  the  composing-room.  Fred.  Gedney,  the  author 
of  "  In  the  Saddle,"  the  new  serial  of  Putnam's,  is  fishing  for  letters  in  the 
Post-Offlce  box.  Zebulon  White,  with  the  pale  face  of  a  college  student, 
is  writing  up  a  real  estate  report.  A  man  of  quiet  ability,  he  is  one  of  the 
most  trustworthy  reporters  in  the  office.  Robert  W.  McAlpine,  formerly 
an  editor  on  The  Philadelphia  Press  and  The  Washington  Chronicle — a 
smooth-faced  man,  who  might  easily  be  taken  for  an  interpreter  for  the 
Chinese  Embassy — is  busily  dashing  off  a  New- York  letter  for  a  prominent 
Western  journal.  His  brother  Thomas  is  smoking  over  a  paper-covered 
edition  of  Shakespeare.  Nathan  D.  Urner,  a  heavy-built  man,  resembling 
a  Mexican  ranchero  in  pursuit  of  novelties,  has  just  finished  a  campaign 
song  for  The  Tribune,  and  is  punctuating  it,  preparatory  to  slipping  it  into 
the  Managing  Editor's  private  box.  He  is  the  writer  of  the  sensation 
report  of  the  Barnum's  Museum  fire  printed  in  The  Tribune  in  July,  1865, 
and  copied  and  recopied  as  an  actual  verity  by  English,  Australian,  and 
American  papers.  George  W.  Pearce,  the  Police  Reporter,  a  rosy-com- 
plexioned,  blue-eyed  little  gentleman,  who  seems  as  spry  as  a  circus-rider, 
is  hurriedly  dashing  off  an  "  Immense  Robbery  in  Wall  Street,"  stopping 
suddenly  to  perpetrate  a  joke,  and  then  growling  at  the  late  hours  assigned 
him  at  Police  Headquarters.  Quinlan,  a  thin,  ebon-eyed,  black-mustached 
reporter,  is  accusing  Meeker,  an  active,  smooth-faced  boy,  fresh  from  the 
prairies  of  Illinois,  of  borrowing  his  paste-pot,  and  Ralph,  in  a  nasal 
twang,  is  retorting  by  a  counter  accusation,  involving  the  loss  of  a  pair 
of  scissors.  George  H.  Stout,  the  Law  Reporter  of  The  Tribune,  is  con- 
versing with  Oswald  Allen,  a  pink-cheeked  genius  of  twenty-one,  about 
the  relative  speed  of  American  race-horses,  as  compared  with  English 
stock.  The  door  opens,  and  N.  G.  Shepherd,  the  poet,  walks  to  the  letter- 
box like  a  Hamlet  in  distress,  and  then  dignifiedly  retires  with  a  tiny 


CTTT   EDITOR.  45? 

envelope.  Oliver  B.  Stout,  for  twelve  years  the  Reporter  of  The  Tribune 
at  the  City  Hall,  is  telling  the  story  of  the  rise  and  fall  of  Frank  Boole  to 
Curtis  F.  Gilbert,  whose  pale  blue  eyes  snap  with  delight  at  the  recital. 
J.  E.  Burke,  an  old  New- York  reporter,  who  has  been  employed  on  nearly 
every  paper  in  the  city,  is  squinting  over  an  immense  book  in  search  of  an 
assignment  to  duty.  Thatcher,  the  weather  man,  the  successor  of  the  sage 
of  Brooklyn  Heights,  enters  the  door,  and  in  response  to  numerous  ques- 
tions, decides  that  it  will  not  rain  within  forty  hours.  The  Professor  is  an 
old  man  of  about  fifty-five,  dressed  in  a  seedy,  snuff-coloured  suit,  wearing 
a  rusty  high  hat,  and  a  heavy-soled  pair  of  shoes.  For  twenty-five  years  he 
has  run  the  telescope  business  during  the  dead  hours  of  the  night  in  front 
of  St.  Paul's  Church.  He  has  built  himself  a  cabin  among  the  clouds  on 
the  roof  of  a  nine-story  building  in  Duane  street,  and  there  carries  on  his 
astronomical  and  barometrical  observations  when  not  on  guard  in  front 
of  St.  Paul's.  Shaking  hands  with  Cassius  Morey,  a  boy  who  took  root  in 
The  Tribune  office  twelve  years  ago,  and  has  now  sprouted  into  an  efficient 
reporter,  the  Professor  stumbles  against  Alfred  Armant  and  retires.  And 
such  is  an  average  daily  scene  in  the  reportorial  rooms  of  The  Tribune. 

The  City  Editor  of  The  Tribune  is  held  responsible  for  the  gathering  of 
every  item  of  news  within  a  radius  of  fifty  miles  from  New- York.  The 
rapid  growth  of  the  city  has  rendered  this  necessary.  Over  75,000  persona 
doing  business  in  New- York  reside  in  the  country,  and  become  interested 
in  hamlet  news.  The  Tribune  satisfies  this  interest  by  daily  reports  of 
everything  occurring  within  fifty  miles  of  the  city.  Newark  and  Paterson, 
for  instance,  have  no  morning  newspapers.  After  their  evening  journals 
go  to  press,  Tribune  reporters  ransack  each  city  until  midnight  in  search 
of  news,  and  use  either  special  messengers  or  the  telegraph  in  forwarding 
their  returns.  The  Tribune  is  thus  a  morning  newspaper  for  such  cities. 
The  Tribune  has  thirty-two  reporters  under  the  order  of  its  City  Editor. 
Thirteen  of  them  are  paid  salaries  ranging  from  fifteen  to  thirty-seven 
dollars  per  week,  and  the  remainder  work  by  the  piece.  On  Friday  each 
reporter  makes  out  his  bill  on  a  blank,  giving  the  date  of  the  report,  the 
number  of  hours  spent  in  obtaining  it,  the  number  of  lines  furnished,  and 
the  number  actually  printed,  with  a  statement  of  expenses. 

The  printed  slips  are  pasted  to  the  bill  as  a  voucher,  and  it  is  handed  to 
the  City  Editor,  who  carefully  examines  and  endorses  it,  and  then  turns  it 
over  to  the  Managing  Editor,  who,  after  a  close  scrutiny,  draws  up  a  check, 
which  is  paid  to  the  reporter  in  person  at  the  counting-room.  The  City 
Editor  arrives  at  the  office  at  ten  A.  M.,  and  immediately  overhauls  the 
morning  papers,  reading  the  advertisements  with  special  care.  Every 
announcement  of  a  political  meeting,  lecture,  horse-race,  excursion,  real 
estate  sale,  execution,  hotel-opening,  steamboat-launch,  etc.,  is  clipped  out 
and  pasted  in  a  blank  book.  Special  attention  is  given  to  the  country 
papers  published  in  the  vicinity.  Nothing  escapes — or  should  escape — 
the  eye  of  the  City  Editor.  Notices  of  executions  and  College  Commence- 
ments, and  of  all  political  and  scientific  convocations,  are  pasted  in  the 
book  a  month  in  advance.  Having  carefully  gone  through  the  papers,  the 


458  LIFE  OF   HORACE   OREELET. 

City  Editor  writes  the  name  of  the  reporter  he  wishes  to  employ  opposite 
the  pasted  slip.  At  noon  the  reporters  enter,  and  copy  their  assignments 
from  the  book,  drawing  a  line  under  each  of  their  names,  to  assure  the 
City  Editor  that  they  are  aware  of  their  detail  and  will  attend  to  it.  Look 
at  the  book,  and  you  will  find  such  entries  as  these : 

John  Allen's  Prayer-Meeting,  Water  street,  12  M. —  White. 

American  Geographical  Society,  Historical  Society  Rooms,  2d  avenue  and  llth  street, 
8  p.  M.— Meeker. 

Grant  and  Colfax  Meeting,  Broadway  and  22d  street,  8  P.  M.— Armant. 

Dog  Fight  at  Kit  Burns',  Water  street,  9  p.  M.— Mix. 

Special  service.— Gilbert. 

See  Longstreet,  and  have  an  interview  with  him  at  the  New- York  Hotel;  make  a 
column. — Gedney. 

Police  Headquarters. — Morey. 

Jefferson  Market  Police  Court. — Mix. 

A  two  column  article  on  Local  Nominations. — McGrew. 

When  the  City  Editor  has  an  idea  of  beating  the  other  journals  on  a 
particular  point  of  news,  he  marks  down  a  trusty  reporter  for  "  special 
duty."  Such  reporter  gets  verbal  orders  from  his  chief,  and  is  expected  to 
fill  them  to  the  letter.  If  his  assignment  was  given  on  the  book,  some 
news  shark  might  copy  it,  and  furnish  a  report  for  an  opposition  news- 
paper. The  City  Editor  must  necessarily  be  a  keen  judge  of  men.  One 
reporter  would  write  up  a  horse-race  in  brilliant  style,  but  would  shock- 
ingly butcher  a  fashionable  ball.  A  religious  reporter — and  there  are 
such — would  hardly  give  a  readable  account  of  a  cock  main  or  a  dog-fight, 
and  a  reporter  posted  on  sporting  matters  would  make  a  poor  fist  of  it  if 
sent  to  do  up  the  consecration  of  a  church  or  the  ordination  of  a  bishop. 
Special  men  are  adapted  to  special  work.  The  Managing  Editor  recognizes 
this  fact  when  he  selects  his  lieutenants,  and  the  City  Editor  exercises  the 
same  discrimination  when  picking  out  his  non-commissioned  officers  and 
privates. 

"Eh?  Mr.  Young?  Yes,  sir,  he's  here.  Do' ye  want  to  see 'm?"  replies 
Johnny  Weinheimer,  in  answer  to  our  inquiry. 

"  Certainly,  if  he  is  disengaged." 

"  I'll  tell  you  in  a  second." 

Johnny  peeps  through  a  small  hole  in  the  ground  glass  of  the  door  to 
Young's  room,  then  darts  back  to  a  match-safe  hanging  at  our  side,  and 
pulls  therefrom  two  square  slips  of  letter-paper. 

"  Please  write  your  names  on  this  paper — or,  if  you've  got  your  cards 
•with  you,  they'll  do  jis  as  well.  I'll  take  'em  in  to  Mr.  Young." 

Our  cards  go  in,  and  in  ten  seconds  we  are  ushered  into  the  presence  ol 
the  Managing  Editor  of  The  Tribune.  You  glance  at  John  Russell  Young 
and  then  gaze  back  at  Johnny,  as  if  j-ou  thought  he  was  perpetrating  a 
joke  at  our  expense.  What!  this  bluereyed  boy  the  Managing  Editor  of 
the  most  influential  journal  in  America!  You  can  hardly  believe  it.  In 
personal  appearance  Mr.  Young  is  the  most  insignificant  person  about  the 
office.  He  is  lightcomplexioned,  has  a  large,  sloping  head,  thatched  with 
brown  hair,  a  clear  forehead,  and  a  prominent  nose,  and  is  as  quick  of 


JOHN   EUSSELL  YOUNG.  459 

motion  as  a  sparrowhawk.    He  is  of  medium  height — say  five  feet  eight 
His  words  flow  from  his  lips  in  rapid  succession,  as  if  each  one  was  strug- 
gling to  get  out  of  his  mouth  ahead  of  the  other.    And  this  man  has 
flashed  upon  the  journalists  of  New- York  like  a  literary  comet.    Twelve 
years  ago  he  was  a  printer's  devil ;  when  South  Carolina  sprouted  into 
secession  he  was  a  reporter  in  Philadelphia;  one  year  more  found  him  a 
Dramatic  Critic  on  The  Washington  Chronicle ;  six  years  ago  he  was  the 
Managing  Editor  of  The  Philadelphia  Press ;  two  years  after  this  he  was 
with  General  Banks  during  the  Red  River  expedition;  next  we  find  him 
an  agent  of  Jay  Cooke's  in  7.30  times.    While  at  this  business,  in  his  leisure 
hours,  he  wrote  editorials  for  The  Tribune.    They  were  unusually  spicy 
and  argumentative,  attracted  the  attention  of  Mr.  Greeley  and  Sidney 
Howard  Gay,  and  now  that  printer's  devil  is  a  newspaper  autocrat — the 
peer  of  statesmen,  and  a  potent  power  in  the  land.    At  first  sight  he 
appears  common-place,  but  when  you  talk  with  him,  and  partly  fathom 
the  depth  of  that  wonderful  blue  eye,  and  the  decisive  cut  of  the  nose  and 
the  mouth,  you  recognize  an  impress  of  a  peculiar  intellectual  vitality,  a 
fertility  of  resource,  a  quickness  of  comprehension,  and  a  nervous  energy 
that  stamps  him  as  a  steam-engine  among  newspaper  men.    His  attire  is 
neat,  but  not  foppish.    He  wears  one  of  those  little  round-topped  hats, 
with  a  small,  circular  rim,  and  this  increases  his  boyish  appearance.    His 
room  is  lined  with  books  of  reference.    It  is  a  portion  of  the  old  library 
of  the  office.    Files  of  The  New-Yorker  and  Greeley's  old  "  Log  Cabin  " 
are  dreaming  on  shelves  near  the  floor.    Files  of  The  Tribune,  Herald, 
World,  and  Times,  from  the  date  of  their  first  publication  to  the  present 
hour,  all  neatly  bound,  are  at  hand.    Congressional  Globes,  Niles's  Regis- 
ter, Encyclopedias,  Concordances,  Political  Manuals,  Rebellion  Records, 
and  hundreds  of  other  valuable  books  of  reference  stand  against  the  wall 
in  martial  array.    Bronze  statuettes  and  lively  coloured  chromos  occupy 
various  positions  in  the  room.    Young  writes  by  spasms.    He  pays  strict 
attention  to  the  business  details  of  the  office.    Every  letter,  every  bill, 
every  rejected  communication  is  filed.    He  is  able  to  furnish,  at  a  moment's 
notice,  a  filed  voucher  for  every  cent  of  expenditure  during  his  adminis- 
tration.   Such  strict  attention  to  business  requires  a  vast  amount  of  time. 
But  when  a  great  national  emergency  arises,  especially  during  the  absence 
of  H.G.,  he  throws  himself  into  the  breach  with  characteristic  energy,  and 
the  columns  of  The  Tribune  are  red-hot  with  his  short,  sharp,  ringing 
sentences,  until  the  storm  has  passed.    His  were  the  stinging  editorials  on 
the  Philadelphia  Convention,  his  were  the  columns  of  invective  poured 
over  the  Impeachment  renegades,  his  were  the  fierce  attacks  upon  the  far- 
born  movement  to  nominate  Grant  before  the  General  had  defined  his 
position,  and  his  are  the  showers  of  sarcasm  launched  upon  John  T. 
Hoffman.    The  phrase,  "  Impeachment  is  Peace,"  is  Young's ;  so  are  the 
words,  "  Let  us  have  Peace."    He  it  was  who  called  Grant  "  a  sashed  and 
girded  sphinx."    He  it  was  who  wrote   the  brilliant  book  reviews  on 
Buchanan's  "  Defence  of  his  Administration,"  "  Greeley's  American  Con- 
flict,"  and  Richardson's  "  Life  of  Grant."    There  are  no  lazy  hairs  in  his 


460  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELET. 

head ;  each  one  seems  to  be  inspired  with  electric  energy.  As  Butler  waa 
the  author  of  the  word  "  Contraband,"  applied  to  the  slaves  of  Rebels,  so 
is  Young  the  author  of  the  word  "  Copperhead,"  as  applied  to  the  members 
of  the  Democratic  party. 

He  motions  us  to  a  seat.  Dickens  has  occupied  this  same  chair.  Sickles, 
Sheridan,  Longstreet,  Meade,  Pryor,  Butler,  Hill,  Howard,  Rosecrans,  and 
fifty  other  generals,  of  more  or  less  renown,  have  ground  their  elbows  on 
this  very  table.  Colfax,  Ashley,  Wilson,  "Wendell  Phillips,  Sumner,  Grow, 
Washburne,  Burlingame,  Griswold,  Kelley,  Boutwell,  and  a  hundred  other 
distinguished  statesmen  have  played  with  this  paper-cutter.  Miles 
O'Reilly,  Bancroft,  Sam.  Bowles,  George  William  Curtis,  Theodore  Tilton, 
A.  D.  Richardson,  Anthony  Trollope,  R.  B.  Rhett,  E.  A.  Pollard,  Mark 
Twain,  Petroleum  Nasby,  Col.  T.  B.  Thorpe,  and  three-score  of  well-known 
authors  and  editors  have  brushed  their  shins  against  this  table-leg. 
Abraham  Lincoln  spent  a  night  in  this  room,  in  a  revision  of  his  Cooper 
Institute  speech,  in  the  Winter  of  1859.  The  writer  of  this  article  read  the 
first  proof-sheet,  and,  had  he  saved  the  manuscript,  would  have  been,  at 
this  time,  $1,000  in  pocket.  Edgar  A.  Poe  used  to  borrow  money  of  Horace 
Greeley  in  this  apartment.  John  Brown,  Henry  Ward  Beecher,  and  Lloyd 
Garrison  have  gazed  at  this  library.  Viscount  de  Chalrol,  Lord  Morley, 
Lord  Camperdown,  Thurlow  Weed,  Kossuth,  Jay  Cooke,  Edwin  Forrest, 
Mrs.  Yelverton,  Hawthorne,  Webster,  Clay,  Chase,  O'Baldwin,  and  Seward 
have  all  trodden  this  floor. 

Young  is  a  strict  disciplinarian.  He  runs  the  editorial  department  like 
a  machine.  Every  cog  strikes  its  groove  with  punctual  regularity.  When 
he  is  absent  his  duties  fall  on  Mr.  John  R.  G.  Hassard.  If  Hassard  is 
missing,  Mr.  Amos  J.  Cummings  takes  the  manager's  chair,  and  so  perfect 
does  everything  jibe,  that  if  all  the  editors  were  absent  the  oldest  reporter, 
like  the  senior  sergeant  of  a  company  destitute  of  commissioned  officers, 
•would  take  charge. 

An  editorial  council  is  held  in  the  Managing  Editor's  room  every  day, 
between  the  hours  of  1  and  2  p.  M.  Mr.  Young  presides.  Mr.  D.  C. 
McEwcn,  his  private  secretary,  a  stenographer,  and  one  of  the  witnesses  in 
the  impeachment  trial,  sits  at  his  side.  The  editors  are  seated  about  the 
table.  Mr.  Hassard,  a  tall,  straight  gentleman,  with  a  light  complexion, 
blue  eyes,  regular  features,  sandy  mustache  and  side  whiskers,  and  legs 
like  those  of  President  Lincoln,  occupies  a  chair  at  Mr.  Young's  left.  Mr. 
Hassard  writes  English  as  smooth  as  the  music  of  a  rippling  brook,  and 
frequently  dashes  off  an  editorial  article  steeped  in  an  original  solution  of 
humour  and  sarcasm.  In  addition  to  his  other  duties,  Mr.  Hassard  does 
the  musical  criticisms  of  the  paper.  Opposite  him  is  Mr.  Denslow,  for- 
merly Managing  Editor  of  The  Chicago  Republican.  He  has  a  dark  eye, 
a  Napoleonic  nose,  and  a  black  mustache.  He  is  the  only  black-ejred 
editor  in  the  office.  His  opinions  are  firm-set,  and,  though  his  editorials 
occasionally  conflict  with  the  views  of  Mr.  Greeley,  they  are  marked  with 
deep  thought,  and  are  carefully  prepared.  He  usually  writes  on  financial 
or  reconstructive  measures,  though  Mr.  Greeley  does  more  ">f  this  work 


AN   EDITORIAL   COUNCIL.  461 

than  any  other  man  in  the  office.  At  the  right  of  Mr.  Hassard  is  Prof. 
A.  J.  Schem,  the  Foreign  Editor,  and  the  compiler  of  The  Tribune  Alma- 
nac.  He  is  a  large,  smooth-faced  German,  with  eyes  of  imperial  blue,  and 
a  head  broad  and  well  balanced,  somewhat  resembling  portraits  of  Bis- 
marck. His  eyes  are  full  of  language.  He  has  frequently  been  mistaken 
for  Mr.  Greeley.  He  compiles  the  "  Foreign  News,"  and  writes  the  edito- 
rials on  European  and  other  foreign  matters  of  interest.  He  has  a  happy 
faculty  of  catching  an  unconscious  nap  during  the  composition  of  his 
editorials,  which  greatly  endears  him  to  the  Night  Editor.  His  slight 
accent  betrays  his  Teutonic  origin.  Mr.  Cummings,  the  City  and  Political 
Editor,  sits  at  the  foot  of  the  table,  opposite  Mr.  Young.  He  is  a  pale, 
thin,  blue-eyed  man,  of  a  nervous-sanguine  temperament,  and  eternally  at 
work.  During  the  editorial  councils  he  listens  with  deep  interest,  and 
fills  in  the  interstices  of  time  by  drawing  strange  characters  on  the  paper 
before  him.  He  compiles  the  campaign  and  presidency  columns  of  the 
paper,  works  up  election  tables,  writes  editorial  paragraphs,  dashes  through 
the  exchange  papers,  and  takes  charge  of  everything  pertaining  to  poli- 
tical or  city  matters.  Originally  a  Douglas  Democrat,  he  now  believes  in 
God  and  Horace  Greeley.  He  shudders  at  the  very  mention  of  the  "  Citi- 
zens' Association,"  and  Kit  Burns  could  stand  in  no  greater  dread  of 
Henry  Bergh  than  Cummings.  The  names  of  both  parties  suggest  im- 
mense manuscript  rolls  of  bad  English,  backed  by  heartrending  appeals 
for  immediate  place  in  the  columns  of  The  Tribune.  Cummings  has  set 
type  in  nearly  every  State  in  the  Union,  and  was  a  sergeant-major  in  tho 
army.  He  worked  at  the  case  in  the  composing-room  for  six  years,  off 
and  on,  and  was  transferred  to  the  Editorial  Department  during  Mr.  Guy's 
administration.  On  his  right  is  Mr.  N.  C.  Meeker,  the  successor  of  Solon 
Robinson  in  the  Agricultural  Department.  Mr.  Meeker  is  a  thin,  spare 
man,  of  an  olive  complexion,  with  light  blue  eyes,  and  a  farmer's  face, 
hands  and  dress.  His  desk  is  usually  covered  with  patent  rat-traps,  purn- 
kin-seeds,  corn-shellers,  fancy  potatoes,  washing-machines,  crab-apples, 
cucumber-bug  killers,  and  similar  vegetables  and  contrivances.  For  many 
years  Mr.  Meeker  wrote  for  The  Tribune  those  remarkable  agricultural 
letters  dated  at  Dongola,  111.,  and  when  the  venerable  author  of  "  Hot 
Corn  "  grew  mellow  with  age,  and  retired  to  his  farm  in  Westchester,  he 
was  called  to  fill  the  vacancy.  And  well  has  he  done  so.  Mr.  Meeker 
writes  the  crop  editorials,  the  Farmers'  Club  reports,  and  all  agricultural 
articles.  Next  to  Mr.  Meeker  we  find  Clarence  Cook,  the  terror  of  artists 
and  engravers.  So  trenchant  are  his  criticisms  that  artists  have  been 
known  to  run  from  him  on  the  street  as  they  would  at  the  sight  of  a  mad 
dog,  and  in  some  artistic  circles  he  is  entirely  tabooed.  Writing  in  a  vein 
of  terrible  sarcasm,  Mr.  Cook  is  singularly  mild  and  pleasant  in  his 
demeanour.  He  would  step  into  the  mud  to  avoid  crushing  a  worm.  He 
has  a  mild,  hazel  eye,  red  whiskers,  and  dresses  in  white,  wearing  glasses 
and  a  bob-tailed  coat.  Mr.  Wm.  "Winter,  the  Dramatic  Editor  of  The 
Tribune,  comes  in  late — he  usually  does.  He  is  a  small,  thin  gentleman, 
with  straight  brown  hair,  a  soft  blue  eye,  and  an  effeminate  mustache — 


462  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

sustains  a  little  straw  hat  with  a  big  ribbon,  and  has  not  been  inaptly 
described  as  looking  like  a  German  Turner  going  to  a  funeral.  He  suc- 
ceeded Ned  House  as  Dramatic  Critic.  His  criticisms  are  universally 
regarded  as  the  best  in  the  city.  His  contributions  to  the  editorial  page 
are  spicy  and  brilliant.  Last  of  all  at  the  table  we  find  Mr.  Whitelaw 
Reid,  of  Cincinnati,  the  latest  addition  to  the  force.  He  looks  like  Theo- 
dore Tilton,  with  his  angular  points  rubbed  off.  He  talks  very  easy,  and 
writes  ditto.  His  articles  are  pithy  and  argumentative,  and  have  attracted 
considerable  attention.  And  such  are  the  satellites  of  Horace  Greeley. 
McConnell,  the  Night  Editor,  seldom  attends  these  conferences.  Late 
morning  hours  forbid. 

And  this  is  the  "  staff"  of  The  Tribune.  When  all  are  seated  Mr.  Young 
nervously  dances  around  his  desk  for  forty  seconds,  and  then  dumps  on  the 
table  a  basket  piled  with  manuscripts,  memoranda,  and  newspaper 
clippings.  While  these  are  being  assorted  a  running  fire  of  gossip  springs 
up,  and  Jokes  fly  about  the  table.  The  pile  being  assorted,  business 
begins.  Mr.  Young  picks  up  a  newspaper  slip,  looks  at  it  a  second,  taps 
it  with  a  scurvy  pair  of  scissors,  and  says : 

"  Now,  this  Associated  Press  dispatch  is  evidently  a  Rebel  lie — two  hun- 
dred armed  negroes  attack  fifty  unarmed  whites,  and  two  whites  are 
wounded  and  fifty  negroes  are  killed — what  perfect  nonsense !  Reid,  you 
write  an  article  on  this  business  for  to-morrow's  paper,  and  have  Dr.  Wood 
look  up  the  other  cases  in  which  the  Associated  Press  dispatches  are  toned 
by  the  Rebels." 

Here  the  slip  is  crumpled  up,  rolled  briskly  into  a  little  ball  between  the 
palms  of  his  hands,  and  then  tossed  into  the  waste  basket.  A  copy  of 
The  World  goes  spinning  across  the  table  to  Cummings,  with  the  remark  : 

"  I  think  The  World  beat  you  in  its  account  of  that  murder  this  morn- 
ing." 

"  That's  very  probable,  but  we  beat  them  on  the  fire  and  a  murder  in 
Weehawken,"  Cummings  replies. 

Young  here  seizes  a  pile  of  manuscript  and  hands  it  over  to  Hassard, 
without  a  word.  On  the  back  of  the  pile  is  written : 

"  Mr.  H.,  please  read  and  report.  J.  R.  T." 

Another  glance  at  a  memorandum,  and  McEwen  is  told  to  telegraph 
Smalley,  in  London,  to  send  a  man  to  Roumania  immediately,  to  watch 
the  insurrection  there.  "  And  ask  ****,  in  Constantinople,  if  there  is  any 
truth  in  the  report  from  Washington  that  the  Turks  are  about  to  withdraw 
from  Crete.  Use  the  cypher." 

Both  orders  are  directly  filled,  a  bell-cord  is  jerked,  and  in  one  minute  a 
Tribune  boy  is  trottiug  to  the  telegraph  office  with  despatches  for  London 
and  Constantinople  in  his  pocket. 

A  pile  of  foreign  letters,  ranging  from  Chili  to  Japan,  via  Europe,  is 
tossed  to  Schem,  accompanied  with  the  words : 

"  Oh,  Schem,  I  want  an  editorial  from  you  to-night  on  Louis  Napoleon4! 
suppression  of  La  Lanterne  I" 


AN   EDITORIAL   COUNCIL.  463 

Another  glance  at  a  square  slip  of  paper  —  "McEwen,  telegraph  Jim 
Toung  to  catch  Rosecrans,  as  he  returns  to  Washington  from  White  Sul- 
phur  Springs,  and  freeze  on  to  him  until  he  gets  the  nature  of  that  corre- 
spondence, and  write  McConnell  (the  night  editor)  that  the  news  from 
Atlanta  should  have  been  put  in  leaded  brevier,  under  a  pica  head,  and 
that  O'Donnell's  Mexican  letter  should  have  had  an  Ed.  head." 

A  bundle  of  foolscap,  all  about  the  Pacific  Railroad,  is  here  tumbled  to 
Denslow,  with  the  "  Read  and  Report "  label,  and  an  order  to  hunt  up  a 
copy  of  the  Georgia  State  Constitution,  and  write  an  editorial  on  the 
trouble  at  Atlanta.  Cummings  is  cautioned,  in  the  same  breath,  to  watch 
the  Atlanta  papers  for  a  copy  of  Turner's  speech. 

Meeker  gets  a  dose  of  enquiries  in  odd  bundles,  asking  his  opinion  as 
to  the  best  means  of  keeping  turnip-tops  free  from  hen-lice;  whether  it  is 
best  to  sow  onions  during  a  full  moon ;  whether  children  can  be  poisoned 
by  locusts,  and  a  score  of  similar  manuscript  questions. 

Cummings  is  told  to  write  an  editorial  on  the  yachting  season,  and  is 
further  informed  that  Mr.  Greeley  wants  a  complete  list  of  the  Congress 
and  Assembly  nominations,  so  far  as  made,  with  the  majorities  in  each 
district,  published  as  soon  as  possible.  McEwen  is  told  to  telegraph  "  our 
man "  in  San  Francisco  that  he  is  behind  in  his  Japanese  and  Oregon 
news.  Hassard  is  given  a  score  of  short  editorial  paragraphs  to  write ; 
and  when  the  mountain  of  manuscripts  in  front  of  the  managing  editor 
has  been  run  through  the  mill,  and  a  mushroom  hill  has  sprung  up  in  the 
front  of  every  member  of  the  staff,  a  roll  of  standing  proofs  is  overhauled. 
Here  are  fifty  columns  of  special  correspondence,  political  and  scientific 
articles,  and  news  matter  already  in  type,  and  struggling  for  a  place  in 
The  Tribune.  Fresh  proofs  of  the  matter  left  over  from  the  last  issue  of 
the  paper  are  pulled  every  morning,  and  are  sent  to  the  Managing  Editor. 
He  now  runs  over  these  proofs,  dashing  his  blue  crayon  through  the  unim- 
portant matters,  marking  "  absolutely  must "  over  particular  articles,  and 
dotting  the  sides  of  the  proof  sheets  with  sentences  like  the  following: 
"  Send  a  proof  of  this  article  to  Mr.  Greeley ;"  "get  this  in  as  soon  as  pos- 
sible;" "put  this  table  in  half  measure;"  "send  the  copy  of  this  to  J.  R 
Y.,"  etc. 

"  McEwen,  send  this  slip  to  Congdon,  and  tell  him  to  give  us  a  half 
column  sarcastic  review  of  it,  and  here  is  something  for  Stockton.  Mail 
it  the  first  thing  after  the  meeting." 

Each  editor  is  then  asked  for  his  report  of  the  previous  day's  labour, 
after  which  suggestions  from  every  one  present  are  in  order.  The  meeting 
is  then  dismissed,  with  the  words :  "  The  Trib.  would  look  verv  well  to- 
day were  it  not  for  the  poor  quality  of  the  paper  and  the  infernal  press- 
work.  I  believe  the  ink  is  stiff.  We  must  have  book  ink.  Mr.  Greeley 
will  write  the  leader  to-morrow  morning,  gentlemen.  If  he  don't,  I  will. 
Mr.  Cook,  here  is  a  chromo  which  I  wish  you  to  notice.  That's  all." 

The  editors  pass  out  the  door,  through  the  city  apartment  into  the  main 
editorial  room,  and  drift  to  their  desks.  In  ten  minutes  a  half  dozen  pens 
are  vigorously  scratching  out  ideas  for  the  next  day's  issue.  The  child 


464  LIFE   OF  IIOKACE  GREEI.CT. 

is  in  embryo,  and  will  be  born  in  the  morning.  Everything  will  move 
with  the  regularity  of  clock-work.  The  editorial-room  resembles  a  lurk- 
ing  place  for  owls ;  the  ceiling  is  low,  the  floor  is  dirty ;  a  dozen  rickety 
cane-bottomed  arm-chairs,  with  high  backs,  three  cases,  filled  with  books 
of  reference,  ten  old  desks,  spattered  with  ink,  two  cabinets,  a  chained 
copy  of  The  Tribune  Almanac,  complete,  and  a  dozen  old  pictures,  give 
an  idea  of  a  rushing  business,  with  an  occasional  dash  at  the  fine  arts. 

"We  find  Mr.  Ripley,  the  Literary  Editor,  hard  at  work,  with  a  huge  pile 
of  books  and  magazines  in  his  front.  His  eye  is  as  bright  as  ever.  He 
has  grown  more  dignified  and  portly  with  the  weight  of  years.  He  does 
his  work  conscientiously.  No  personal  influence  or  sympathetic  appeal 
will  ever  induce  him  to  give  a  favourable  notice  of  any  publication  unless 
he  honestly  thinks  it  deserves  such  notice.  By  this  course  he  has  done 
more  to  elevate  the  standard  of  American  literature  than  any  man  in  this 
country.  He  and  Charles  A.  Dana  entered  the  office  over  twenty  years 
ago.  "  Father  Ripley,"  as  he  is  affectionately  termed,  then  received  five 
dollars  a  week,  and  for  his  services  Dana  drew  twelve.  Now  "Father 
Ripley  "  is  a  stockholder,  but  still  holds  his  old  position,  with  a  good 
many  "  Os "  to  the  5.  He  is  pleasant  and  sociable  with  those  who  never 
blow  tobacco  smoke  in  his  face,  or  eject  saliva  about  his  desk.  He  has  an 
exquisite  sense  of  order  and  cleanliness,  and  frequently  picks  up  envelopes 
and  torn  pieces  of  paper  littering  the  floor  and  tosses  them  into  the  waste 
basket.  If  he  find  a  pool  of  tobacco  spittle  near  his  desk  he  will  either 
order  an  office  boy  to  take  a  brown  piece  of  paper  and  scrub  the  floor  or 
do  it  himself.  He  has  many  distinguished  visitors.  Sumner,  Bancroft, 
Wilson,  and  scores  of  similar  men,  frequently  drop  in  the  office  for  an 
hour's  chat  with  Mr.  Ripley.  A  glance  at  his  smiling  face  and  curly  iron- 
gray  locks  brings  to  memory  the  days  of  Hildreth,  Fry,  Bayard  Taylor, 
Margaret  Fuller,  Gay,  Cleveland,  Sam.  Wilkeson,  Oliver  Johnson,  A.  H. 
Byington,  Don.  Henderson,  Richelieu  Robinson,  Doesticks,  Ottarson, 
England,  Neil,  and  others.  May  he  live  long,  and  his  shadow  never  be 
less! 

Here  is  a  curiosity.  Let  us  look  at  the  cabinet  adjoining  Cummings's 
desk.  Here  are  fifty  sliding  drawers,  labelled  with  names  of  the  various 
States  and  Territories.  They  are  filled  with  political  scraps  and  clippings, 
all  arranged  with  reference  to  the  label  distinguishing  the  drawer.  If  you 
wish  to  find  out  the  Republican  nominee  for  Cbngress  in  the  Vlllth  Mis- 
souri, or  the  Vth  South  Carolina  District,  or  the  Democratic  candidate 
for  Assembly  in  the  lid  Ulster  District,  or  the  latest  figures  from  Colorado, 
Cummings  is  just  the  man  for  you  to  interrogate.  He  slides  open  a 
particular  drawer  and  gives  you  the  names  of  the  nominees,  and  the 
majorities  given  at  the  elections  within  the  past  four  years,  at  short  order. 

In  the  bottom  drawers  of  this  cabinet  we  find  a  series  of  carefully  written 
obituaries  of  distinguished  live  men,  all  arranged  alphabetical^,  and  in 
charge  of  Dr.  "Wood.  They  are  curiosities  in  their  way.  Here  is  a  bulky 
one,  as  thick  and  as  long  as  your  arm.  It  is  marked  "Peter  Cooper."  Here 
is  a  second — a  Lilliputian  roll,  small  enough  to  go  into  a  needle-case.  We 


465 

find  this  labelled  "The  Life  of  Walt.  Whitman."  These  obituaries  are 
found  valuable  when  news  of  a  celebrated  person's  death  is  received  at  an 
early  hour  in  the  morning.  Thaddcus  Stevens  died  at  Washington,  at 
midnight,  yet  a  four-column  sketch  of  his  life  appeared  in  The  Tribune  of 
that  morning.  It  had  been  put  up  in  type  and  was  "  standing  "  when  the 
news  of  his  death  was  received.  This  was  the  case  with  Buchanan  and 
Martin  Van  Buren,  though  the  latter  cheated  the  office  so  long  that  the 
type  was  distributed,  and  the  old  man,  with  singular  perverseness,  died 
within  two  days  thereafter.  This  Biographical  Bureau  is,  indeed,  a  rare 
feature. 

In  a  corner  near  the  door  we  find  a  cabinet  of  post-office  boxes,  labelled 
"The  Money  Market,"  "Literary,"  "Foreign  News,"  "The  City,"  "The 
Drama,"  "Agricultural,"  "The  Fine  Arts,"  "Music,"  "Science,"  "The 
Fashions,"  "Telegraphic  News,"  "Managing  Editor,"  etc.  Every  news- 
paper clipping  or  manuscript,  having  any  bearing  on  these  subjects,  is 
dropped  in  its  specific  box,  taken  out  by  the  person  in  charge  of  each 
department,  and  boiled  down  for  use  in  the  papers.  Scrap-books,  Direc- 
tories, Dictionaries,  and  Corporation  Manuals  seem  to  spring  up  about  the 
office  like  chick-weed  in  a  Jersey  garden,  but,  whenever  a  copy  of  the 
Bible  or  Shakespeare  is  wanted,  a  tiresome  search  is  made  before  the  book 
is  found. 

The  lymphatic  gentleman  on  whose  desk  the  Bible  is  usually  found  is 
Mr.  George  O.  Seilhamer,  who  has  charge  of  The  Weekly  and  Semi- 
Weekly  Tribune.  He  it  was  who  went  to  Heart's  Content  when  the  Atlan- 
tic Cable  was  laid,  and  furnished  the  paper  with  an  exclusive  copy  of  the 
Diary  of  the  Great  Eastern,  after  the  English  Admiral  at  Halifax  had 
cribbed  the  Associated  Press  report  for  his  own  personal  perusal.  Mr. 
Seilhamer  is  a  pleasant  writer,  and  is  the  author  of  the  obituaries  of 
Thaddeus  Stevens  and  James  Buchanan.  At  his  side  sits  Mr.  Clarkson 
Taber,  a  plain  country-looking  gentleman,  who  is  writing  out  a  report  of 
the  cattle-market.  He  is  always  thoroughly  posted  on  the  price  of  beef- 
steaks,  and,  on  this  account,  is  held  in  peculiar  reverence  by  editors  and 
reporters.  Fronting  Mr.  Seilhamer  we  find  Mr.  S.  T.  Clarke,  the  financial 
editor,  who  has  groped  his  way  from  the  sewers  of  newspaper  life  to  fame 
and  fortune. 

Here  is  a  quiet,  black-whiskered  gentleman,  plainly  dressed ;  he  has  a 
smiling,  ruddy  face,  and  a  cast  in  one  of  his  brown  eyes ;  he  is  apparently 
about  forty-five  years  old.  This  is  Mr.  R.  W.  Johnson,  a  native  Jamaican, 
and  formerly  the  leader  of  the  Liberals  in  the  Jamaica  Parliament.  He 
was  the  real  head  and  front  of  the  Jamaica  Insurrection,  in  which  George 
William  Gordon  lost  his  life.  A  price  is  fixed  on  Mr.  Johnson's  head  by 
the  pro-slavery  planters  of  that  island,  and,  though  Governor  EJTC  is 
absent,  it  would  hardly  be  safe  for  him  to  visit  his  home. 

So  much  for  a  day  view  of  The  Tribune  editorial  rooms.  Come  here  at 
midnight  and  you  will  find  little  rosy-cheeked,  blue-eyed,  curly-headed 
McConnell  in  charge,  dashing  off  editorial  news  paragraphs,  stripping 
proofs  through  his  fingers,  wading  through  bulky  piles  of  special  corres- 

30 


466  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

pondence,  and  rushing  about  the  room  like  a  bright-eyed  black-and-tan 
in  a  rat-pit.  He  is  a  born  and  bred  newspaper  man,  exercises  his  judg- 
ment on  the  instant,  and  is  rarely  wrong.  During  the  winter  he  officiates 
as  Albany  correspondent.  He  has  a  keen  scent  for  Legislative  corruption, 
and  frequently  catches  thieving  Assembly-men  by  the  hind  leg,  and 
shakes  them  before  the  eyes  of  the  astonished  public,  with  a  portion  of 
their  plunder  still  sticking  to  their  claws.  Then  Mr.  E.  H.  Clement,  a 
college  graduate  and  a  Bostonian,  tills  Mac's  place  in  the  office.  He  is 
young  in  years  but  old  in  appearance.  He  and  White  are  the  only  gentle- 
men connected  with  The  Tribune  who  part  their  hair  in  the  middle. 

At  the  desk  near  the  door  we  find  Dr.  John  B.  Wood,  the  Night  Editor, 
through  whose  hands  passes  all  the  telegraph  and  news  matter.  In  his 
front  lies  a  magazine  of  blue  crayons,  pen-holders,  and  similar  writing 
material.  Fifteen  columns  of  telegrams  for  The  Tribune  have  passed 
through  Wood's  fingers  in  a  single  night 

You  ask  me  if  female  reporters  and  correspondents  are  employed  on 
The  Tribune.  They  are.  Miss  Dunning  writes  the  fashion  reports ;  Miss 
Kate  Field  occasionally  sends  a  letter;  Miss  Booth  frequently  vouchsafes 
a  readable  article ;  Mrs.  L.  Q.  Calhoun  writes  sparkling  correspondence, 
and  Olive  Logan  occasionally  bubbles  over  from  the  Magazines  into  the 
Weekly  Tribune.  Year  before  last  Mrs.  Calhoun  reported  the  grandest 
city  balls,  and  her  descriptions  of  the  Arion  and  Leiderkranz  carnivals 
attracted  great  attention. 
*********** 

Some  people  think  and  say  that  Greeley  is  The  Tribune  and  that  The 
Tribune  is  Greeley.  There  may  be  some  truth  in  the  expression.  But  one 
thing  is  certain,  the  stockholders  of  The  Tribune  are  aware  of  Mr.  Greeley'a 
value.  They  have  had  his  life  insured  for  from  $50,000  to  $100,000  many 
years.  Mr.  Greeley  is  paid  $7,000  a  year  for  his  services.  This,  with  his 
dividend  of  the  profits  of  the  establishment,  makes  quite  a  snug  sum.  He 
also  writes  for  u  dozen  magazines  and  weekley  newspapers,  beside  occa- 
sionally throwing  off  a  book  and  making  stump  political  speeches  and 
lectures.  One  day  you  will  hear  of  him  speaking  at  a  Grant  meeting  at 
Somerville,  New  Jersey ;  the  next  day  he  will  arraign  the  Democracy  at 
Honesdale,  Pennsylvania;  next  you  will  hear  of  him  at  a  temperance 
meeting  in  New- York  city;  on  the  day  following  he  will  speak  before 
some  tariff  association,  then  before  some  agricultural  society,  and  will 
top  off  the  week  with  an  address  before  the  Grant  and  Colfax  Club  at 
Chappaqua,  his  residence.  And  all  the  time  he  keeps  his  end  up  on 
the  editorial  page.  Greeley,  without  doubt,  is  to-day  the  hardest  working 
newspaper  man  in  New- York  city. 

During  the  past  two  years  the  old  readers  of  The  Tribune  have  noticed 
a  marked  improvement  in  the  paper.  Its  columns  have  grown  more 
sparkling  and  fervent,  and  it  has  conducted  the  present  Presidential  cam- 
paign with  an  energy  and  skill  heretofore  unsurpassed.  The  cause  for 
this  change  may  be  found  in  the  youthfulness  of  its  editors.  But  few  of 
them  are  above  thirty  years  of  age;  but  they  are  steadily  growing  gray  in 


READING  PROOF.  4:67 

the  service  of  the  paper,  and  hard  work  and  late  hours  cannot  fail  to  speed- 
ily propitiate  those  of  our  readers  of  the  old  fogy  stripe.  Dream  as  we  wih 
of  the  joys  and  vigour  of  our  youth,  incessant  gas-light  will  induce  the 
inevitable  eye-glass  in  the  end.  There  isn't  much  sun-light  at  the  hour  of 
going  to  press,  but  there  is  enough  care  and  embarrassment  to  bleach  the 
luxuriant  locks  of  "  love's  young  dream ; "  and  none  can  determine  the 
exact  course  of  that  strange  plow-share  of  time  that  leaves  its  irregular 
furrow  in  the  cheek  and  brow.  There  is  one  consolation,  The  Tribune 
will  last  longer  than  any  of  us. 

For  man  and  his  brain-working  may  pass  away,  but  the  principle  that 
inspires  him,  if  a  noble  one,  will  endure  forever. 

We  now  come  to  Mr.  Cummings's  account  of  the  mechanical 
operations  and  last  hours'  work  on  the  paper.  It  must  be 
given  with  the  least  possible  abridgement: 

We  have  seen  the  editorial  rooms.  Open  the  door,  and  we  pass  from  the 
City  Editor's  room  into  the  little  entry  lighted  up  with  a  solitary  gas- 
burner,  which  feebly  flickers  night  and  day.  A  door,  made  of  wood  and 
ground  glass,  and  labelled  "  Proof  Room,"  is  at  our  right.  It  was  the  pri- 
vate entrance  to  Mr.  Greeley's  old  room.  For  ten  years  Horace  composed 
his  editorials  in  this  apartment,  until  at  last  he  was  driven  to  his  present 
sanctum,  above  the  counting-room,  by  a  steady  stream  of  political  vermin, 
who  became  familiar  with  his  working  hours  and  the  entrances  to  his 
room,  and  who  worried  him  day  and  night.  It  was  in  this  room  that  the 
material  was  collected  for  the  Scott  and  Graham,  Fremont  and  Dayton, 
and  the  two  Lincoln  campaigns.  If  these  half-papered  walls  could  whisper, 
they  would  furnish  many  a  missing  and  interesting  chapter  for  the  "  Recol- 
lections of  a  Busy  Life."  This  is  the  room  in  which  Dana  and  Gay  oiled 
the  machinery  for  the  management  of  The  Tribune.  It  was  in  this  apart- 
ment that  the  celebrated  Seward  letter,  the  equally  notorious  Kansas 
editorials,  and  the  "  Just  Once  "  article  following  the  battle  of  Bull  Run 
were  written.  Mr.  Greeley  has  passed  many  a  weary  night  on  the  sofa 
within  this  room.  • 

As  we  stand  at  the  door  we  hear  a  monotonous  burr-r-r-r  and  whirr-r-r-r, 
like  the  complaint  of  a  swift  turning  fly-wheel  in  an  engine  room.  The  noise 
is  caused  by  John  C.  Robinson,  who  is  orajly  flying  over  his  proof  sheets 
at  a  2.40  rate  of  speed.  As  the  door  swings  open  we  take  in  the  room, 
proof-readers  and  furniture,  at  a  glance.  Here  are  three  desks,  four  gas- 
lights, hidden  under  green  shades,  a  small  raised  platform  hugging  a  tin 
copy-box,  which  has  just  descended  from  the  composing  room,  and  four 
proof-readers,  with  damp  strips  of  paper,  freshly  printed,  in  their  front. 
On  our  left  we  find  Mr.  Frank  Cahill,  once  the  editor  of  The  Picayune, 
then  a  soldier  who  marched  with  Sherman  to  the  sea,  next  the  projector 
and  proprietor  of  the  National  Bull  Frog  Show  at  Dodworth's  Hall,  in  1865 
—  a  man  who  has  been  a  theatrical  critic,  a  valued  contributor  to  Vanity 
Fair,  a  police  reporter,  an  editorial  writer,  a  lecturer,  a  theologian,  a  starter 


*68  LIFE   OF  HORACE   GREELEY. 

of  a  dozen  short-lived  comic  magazines,  and  a  New- York  quill  driver  gen. 
erally  for  eighteen  years.  The  companion  of  Edgar  Allan  Poe,  Ned 
Wilkins,  George  Arnold,  Thodore  Winthrop,  Fitz-James  O'Brien,  Artenius 
Ward,  Joseph  C.  Neal,  and  others  of  tbat  really  distinctive  class  of  Bohe- 
mians, Mr.  Cah ill  is  one  of  the  few  men  in  this  city  who  could  -lift  the 
yellow  veil  from  the  dead  faces  of  that  brilliant  youthful  literary  constella- 
tion, now  blotted  out  forever,  paint  a  true  pen-picture  of  their  social  habits, 
and  tell  the  story  of  their  short  but  eventful  lives.  Cahill  handles  a  proof 
sheet  like  an  expert,  and  mumbles  the  printed  words  into  the  ears  of  the 
copy-holder  at  his  side  like  a  drowsy  bumble-bee.  In  the  farther  corner 
John  Robinson  says 

Ham-num- tuition,  num-nnm-cation.  nnm-num 
"N um-iiuru-olution,  num-num-eration,  num-nnm, 

in  a  falsetto  tone,  hour  after  hour  —  rolling  obituaries,  horse  races,  mar- 
riages,  buchu  advertisements,  Clarence  Cook's  art  criticisms,  Greeley's 
ponderous  logic,  ship  news,  Young's  rapier-like  sentences,  and  Bayard 
Taylor's  and  Albert  D.  Richardson's  letters  from  his  tongue  in  the  same 
monotonous  song,  as  if  they  were  strung  together  like  a  medley  on  a 
hurdy-gurdy.  Every  twenty  seconds  he  makes  a  quick  gasp  for  breath, 
and  the  full  lungs  and  glib  tongue  again  send  out  a  string  of  clearly  enun- 
ciated syllables  and  polysyllables,  like  the  quavers  and  demi-semi-quavers 
bubbling  from  the  bosom  and  dancing  from  the  strings  of  Ole  Bull's  vio- 
lin. Robinson  is,  without  doubt,  the  fastest  proof  reader  in  the  world. 
He  marks  his  corrections  on  the  side  of  the  proof  sheet  without  ceasing 
his  reading.  A  quick  eyed  copy-holder  is  required  to  follow  Robinson's 
tongue,  even  on  reprint  copy.  Robinson  himself  has  an  eye  like  a  hawk, 
and,  in  reading  a  proof  sheet,  his  eyes  are  generally  at  least  five  lines 
beyond  his  tongue.  I  have  known  him  to  distinctly  enunciate  a  column 
of  fine  agate  type,  Tribune  measure,  in  nine  minutes.  In  October,  1863, 
he  was  timed  by  Benjamin  L.  Glasby  and  S.  T.  Selleck,  two  of  the  best 
compositors  ever  employed  on  The  Tribune,  when  he  read  and  marked  the 
proof  sheet  corrections  of  fourteen  columns  of  solid  nonpariel  in  an  hour 
and  twenty  minutes.  This  WAS  done  on  a  wager  for  seven  dollars.  The 
sheets  were  afterwards  carefully  read  by  an  experienced  proof  reader,  and 
but  two  typographical  'blunders  (botli  turned  s's)  discovered.  Robinson 
came  to  the  office,  a  boy,  in  1854,  and  has  remained  there  ever  since.  Joe 
Barlow,  the  pleasant  English-faced  copy-holder  at  his  side,  has  been  a 
compositor  and  proof-reader  in  the  same  office  for  fifteen  years.  Eminent 
men  have  held  positions  in  The  Tribune  proof  room.  The  Hon.  George 
Brown,  once  the  leading  member  of  the  Canadian  Parliament,  Alexander 
Mackenzie,  notorious  as  the  leader  of  the  Canadian  Rebellion  in  1839,  and 
Dr.  Palmer,  a  well  known  compiler,  once  held  situations  here.  During  the 
past  year  Thomas  J.  O'Conner,  a  brilliant  and  gifted  young  proof-reader, 
who  had  been  in  the  office  since  boyhood,  has  died.  A  readable  volume 
could  be  written  on  reminiscences  of  The  Tribune  proofroom.  Four  men 
are  constantly  employed  in  reading  the  matter  put  in  type  by  the  fifty-fivf 


FOREMAN  "TOM"  HOOKER.  469 

compositors  on  the  floor  above.  One  man  is  required  to  arrange  the  man- 
uscript copy  for  the  first  reading,  after  which  the  proof  is  sent  up  stairs 
and  corrected.  A  second  or  revise  sheet  of  the  same  matter  is  then  struck, 
which,  with  the  original  proof,  is  sent  down  to  Tom  Robinson,  the  MSS. 
arranger,  who  compares  it  with  the  first  sheet.  If  the  corrections  have  all 
been  made  he  marks  it  "  O.  K."  and  sends  it  up  stairs.  The  type  is  then, 
ready  to  be  thrown  into  the  paper. 

And  now  let  us  visit  Tom  Rooker.  Tom  has  been  the  foreman  of  the 
composing  room  over  twenty  years.  He  owns  five  shares  in  the  paper. 
We  find  him  at  his  desk,  within  five  feet  of  the  door,  writing  out  a  general 
order  for  the  government  of  the  compositors,  and  giving  loud  orders  to  his 
assistants  at  the  same  time.  He  is  in  his  shirt  sleeves.  A  short  check  apron 
girts  his  body  like  a  breast-plate,  hardly  reaching  high  enough  to  cover 
the  diamond  studs  winking  from  his  shirt  bosom.  Mr.  Rooker  is  a  man 
known  by  printers  in  every  State  in  the  Union.  He  has  a  clear  black  eye, 
a  head  of  bushy  iron-gray  hair,  and  has  an  appearance  of  dignity  more  than 
commensurate  with  his  official  position.  In  the  realm  of  Tribune  typog- 
raphy his  word  is  law.  And  it  is  universally  conceded  that,  in  point  of 
typographical  neatness,  the  paper  is  not  surpassed  by  any  journal  on  either 
continent.  Rooker  asks  every  stranger  for  a  "  chaw  tobacco,"  and  talks  to 
his  compositors  like  a  Dutch  uncle  to  his  nephews.  He  is  a  man  of  inven- 
tions, and  has  spent  thousands  of  dollars  in  efforts  to  improve  the  mechan- 
ical department  of  the  paper.  Years  ago  he  formed  the  idea  that  a 
morning  paper  could  be  stereotyped  the  same  as  a  book,  and  thus,  instead 
of  one  form  of  the  paper  being  worked  off  on  one  press,  a  half  dozen  forms 
of  the  same  newspaper  could  be  simultaneously  thrown  upon  the  same 
number  of  presses.  Thus  the  public  could  be  served  with  a  million  copies 
of  The  Tribune  before  daylight  each  morning,  if  necessary.  Two  birds 
could  be  killed  with  one  stone  —  for  the  use  of  a  stereotype  plate  would 
prevent  the  fearful  crushing  and  mashing  of  type  which  accompanied  the 
issue  of  200,000  copies  of  The  Weekly  Tribune.  Year  after  year  Rooker 
tinkered  at  h's  idea,  but  with  indifferent  success.  At  length  he  heard  that 
The  London  Times  was  printed  from  stereotype  plates.  How  the  plates 
were  stereotyped  was  a  mystery  as  impenetrable  as  the  mystery  of  the 
philosopher's  stone.  Two  Swiss  brothers  alone  held  the  key  of  the  mys- 
tery, and  did  the  job  for  The  Times  under  contract.  Tom  wrote  the  broth- 
ers, and  received  a  reply  to  the  effect  that  they  would  put  The  Tribune 
through  their  mill  for  $30,000  annually.  Feeding  a  Hoe  press  a  weekly 
meal  of  type  was  an  expensive  job,  but  hardly  so  costly  as  giving  the  Swiss 
brothers  an  annual  meal  of  $30,000.  Tom  thought  he  could  do  better.  He 
at  once  again  began  to  chisel  out  his  ideas,  with  varying  success.  For 
days  he  would  wander  about  the  office  in  fits  of  brown  study,  and  then, 
fancying  himself  on  the  verge  of  success,  would  caper  among  the  typos, 
and  laugh  at  their  sly  insinuations  at  his  crazy  mania,  like  an  urchin  who 
had  just  learned  to  toss  off  his  first  soap-bubble.  But  success  came  at  last. 
One  day  a  stranger  walked  into  the  composing  room,  shook  hands  with 
Tom,  and  said  he  had  come  to  stereotype  The  Tribune.  The  compositors 


470  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

winked  at  one  another,  and  suggested  that  the  fool-killer  had  not  lately  been 
attending  to  his  business;  but  Tom  Hooker  shoved  a  paper  of  "Mrs. 
Miller's  fine  cut"  in  his  cheek,  stripped  off  his  apron,  put  on  his  Panama 
hat  and  sailed  out  of  the  office  in  company  with  the  stranger.  Two  days 
after  this  a  huge  iron  vat  for  melting  lead  came  up  the  hatchway  from  the 
press  robin.  The  compositors  laughed,  and  said  that  Tom  had  got  a  coffee 
boiler.  Another  week  passed,  and  a  fly-wheel,  two  cog-wheels,  and  circu- 
lar saw  followed  the  iron  vat  The  typos  chuckled  and  whistled,  and  one 
made  the  remark,  "  Tom's  got  'em  bad  this  time."  Belts,  molds,  and  a 
steam  chest  came  next.  The  thing  began  to  look  as  if  it  meant  something. 
At  last,  one  pleasant  summer  afternoon  in  1860,  the  rush  of  wheels  and  the 
sharp  rasp  of  a  circular  saw  filled  the  front  room,  and  a  smoking  mass  of 
hot  lead  was  drawn  from  the  mold  and  laid  upon  the  table.  The  deed  was 
done.  The  first  newspaper  in  America  had  been  stereotyped,  and  Tom 
Hooker's  heart  was  as  light  as  a  school-boy's.  During  the  period  of  Tom's 
anxious  experiments  a  practical  journeyman  stereotyper  was  chasing  up 
the  same  idea,  and  had  succeeded  in  inventing  a  peculiar  kind  of  paper, 
which,  when  dampened,  was  beaten  on  the  face  of  the  type,  then  covered 
with  blankets  and  dried  upon  a  steam  chest,  after  which  it  was  powdered 
with  plaster-of-paris,  laid  in  a  mold,  and  a  plate  produced  which  was  the 
exact  counterpart  of  the  face  of  the  type.  The  Tribune  adopted  the  sys- 
tem immediately.  Eighteen  months  afterwards  the  Times  and  the  Herald 
followed  suit.  Now  the  leading  newspapers  throughout  the  United  States 
are  stereotyped.  After  the  paper  is  issued  the  plates  are  again  tossed  into 
the  furnace,  the  matrix  or  the  paper  mold  being  preserved  for  future  use,  if 
necessary.  But  Tom  was  not  satisfied.  It  took  nearly  an  hour  to  stereo- 
type the  forms,  and  get  the  plates  ready  for  the  press.  He  began  making 
improvements,  and  has  now  got  the  thing  down  to  such  a  fine  point  that  a 
stereotype  plate  is  dropped  on  the  press  in  from  sixteen  to  twenty  minutes 
from  the  time  that  the  type  is  sent  from  the  hands  of  the  printers. 

Come  into  the  composition  room  at  five  minutes  of  seven  in  the  even- 
ing. The  desk  near  the  door  is  littered  with  copy.  Fifty  printers  are 
lounging  about  the  office  in  their  shirt  sleeves  and  aprons,  smoking,  dis- 
tributing type,  correcting  proofs,  swearing  over  the  poor  quality  of  the  gas, 
and  asking  what  number  jumped  out  first  in  the  evening  drawing  of  the 
Kentucky  or  Delaware  lotteries.  Each  compositor  has  a  stand  and  a  rack, 
in  which  are  four  sets  of  cases:  one  for  agate  type,  used  for  setting  up 
advertisements;  another  filled  with  nonpareil,  a  type  a  size  larger,  in  which 
the  main  body  of  the  news  matter  is  set ;  a  third  filled  with  minion  type, 
which  is  used  for  the  special  despatches  from  Washington,  and  for  import- 
ant news  despatches  and  correspondence ;  and  the  fourth  and  last  filled 
with  brevier,  in  which  the  editorials  appear.  The  copy  which  is  to  go  in 
agate  is  cut  into  sections  or  "takes,"  as  the  compositor  calls  them,  and 
strung  on  a  hook  hidden  in  a  box  labeled  "  agate."  The  brevier,  nonpa- 
reil, and  minion  copy  are  also  placed  on  hooks,  in  separate  boxes,  labeled 
with  reference  to  the  face  of  the  type.  One  man  is  employed  solely  in 
cutting  the  copy  into  sections  or  "  takes,"  and  marking  directions  for  the 


SETTING  UP  THE  TRIBUNE.  471 

type  in  which  the  captions  and  sub-captions  of  articles  are  to  appear 
Take  The  Tribune  of  October  28, 1868,  for  example,  and  the  manuscript 
of  the  first  column,  fresh  from  the  hands  of  the  copy-cutter,  would  read 
thus: 

THE  NEW  REBELLION.  [Pica  Caps. 

[Misery  dash. 
REBEL  RIOTS  IN  NEW  ORLEANS.        [Minion  caps 

THE    REBEL    DEMOCRACY    IN    ARMS,  AND    SHOOTING    NEGROES    IN    THE 

STREETS.  [Brevier  small  caps. 

Then  follows  a  mark,  "leaded  nonpareil,"  which  means  that  the  copy  is 
to  be  leaded ;  that  is,  that  a  thin  piece  of  metal  is  to  be  inserted  between 
each  two  lines  of  type,  as  is  the  case  with  this  article  which  now  appears 
in  Packard's  Monthly.  A  little  lower  down  in  this  "New  Rebellion" 
article  we  find  an  order  from  Gen.  Schofleld,  which  is  marked  by  the  copy- 
cutter  in  "solid  nonpareil."  This  means  that  the  leads  are  to  be  left  out 
until  otherwise  directed.  And  thus  every  strip  of  copy  is  dotted  with 
guide  posts  and  sign  boards,  so  that  the  compositor  cannot  go  astray. 
Here  are  twenty  men  carrying  off  twenty  pieces  or  "  takes  "  of  one  article. 
We  will  suppose  it  to  be  an  editorial  of  Mr.  Greeley's.  The  copy-cutter 
slashes  it  into  twenty  pieces  of  about  twenty  lines  each.  The  first  piece 
he  marks  with  a  blue  crayon  "  1  G,"  the  second  piece  "  2  G,"  the  third  "  3 
G,"  and  so  on  up  to  "  20  G."  The  compositors  take  these  pieces  from  the 
hook  as  fast  as  they  are  out  of  copy,  and  as  soon  as  each  piece  is  put  in 
type  the  matter  is  placed  on  a  brass  galley  (similar  to  a  board  with  a  light 
strip  of  wood  on  each  side),  and  a  small  square  piece  of  white  paper, 
marked  "6  G,"  or  whatever  number  designates  the  piece  just  finished  by 
the  compositor,  is  deposited  at  its  side.  You  may  find  "2"  and  "3  G" 
hugging  each  other  on  the  galley,  followed  by  "5,"  "0,"  and  "7  G,"  with 
a  space  left  for  "  4  G  "  when  finished.  When  the  20  G's  are  all  in  their 
places  the  galley  of  type  is  fastened  by  a  curly-headed  gentleman,  known 
as  "the  galley  slave,"  who  strikes  five  proof  sheets — one  for  Mr.  Greeley; 
a  second  for  Mr.  Clements,  the  editor  in  charge  at  night ;  a  third  for  the 
proof  room;  a  fourth  for  Dr.  Wood,  the  regular  night  editor;  and  a  fifth, 
on  yellow  paper,  as  a  voucher  for  the  work  done  by  each  man.  So  Gree- 
ley's article  is  in  type  in  half  an  hour,  and  Horace  carefully  marks  his 
corrections  on  the  proof-sheet,  and  saunters  home  with  his  hands  in  the 
pockets  of  his  overcoat.  By  the  arrangement  described  above,  a  dozen  or 
twenty  articles  may  be  in  process  of  composition  at  the  same  time.  One 
manuscript  will  be  numbered  "  1  XX,"  and  so  on.  The  commercial  review 
generally  goes  out  marked  "  Com.,"  the  markets  "  Ma.,"  the  Washington 
special  "Wa.,"  Young's  editorial  "1  Y,"  &c.,  and  Hassard's  spicy  criti- 
cisms "  Has.,"  &c. 

The  men  in  the  office  are  numbered,  and  each  man  is  known  by  his 
number.  When  he  gets  his  copy  he  begins  his  composition  by  placing  a 
Bietai  slug,  on  which  his  number  is  inscribed,  at  the  head  of  each  piece  or 


db72  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

"  take  "  of  manuscript  drawn  from  the  copy  hook.  This  number  is  printed 
on  the  proof  sheets  at  the  head  of  each  "take."  When  the  proof  returns 
from  the  readers  Fr^nk  Weinheimer  seizes  it,  runs  his  eye  down  the  mar- 
gin until  he  discovers  a  typographical  blunder,  spots  the  number  under 
which  it  has  occurred,  and  sings  out,  at  the  top  of  his  voice, 

"  Proof  for  No. ,  in  a  hurry." 

The  compositor  owning  the  number  picks  up  the  galley,  and  corrects  it 
down  to  a  point  where  he  finds  four  blunders  under  one  number,  when  he 
passes  it  to  said  number,  and  so  the  proof  runs  the  gauntlet  until  all  the 
corrections  are  made.  It  is  then  passed  up  to  the  "  galley  slave,"  who 
pulls  a  fresh  proof —  the  numbers  having  been  drawn  out  and  distributed 
—  which  is  sent  back  to  the  proof  readers.  When  the  revise  returns  the 
galley  is  passed  up  to  the  "make-up  "  —  the  gentleman  who  places  the  type 
in  its  proper  position  in  the  paper.  Frequently  slugs  of  "MUST," 
"ABSOLUTELY  MUST,"  and  "WAIT  ORDERS,"  are  placed  at  the  top 
of  various  articles.  They  explain  themselves.  The  yellow  proof-sheets 
used  as  vouchers  show  the  quantity  of  type  set  by  each  compositor,  and 
are  clipped  every  morning,  the  "takes"  assorted  according  to  their  num- 
bers, and  distributed  among  their  owners.  On  Friday  each  compositor 
pastes  the  proofs  thus  received  together,  in  long  strips,  according  to  the 
face  of  the  type,  which  are  measured  by  ems,  at  56  cents  per  thousand,  and 
for  which  the  typo  receives  his  money  on  Saturday.  A  printer's  "em" 
is  a  space  equivalent  to  the  square  of  the  body  of  the  letter  m  —  that 
letter  being  adopted  as  the  unit  of  measurement  in  composition,  from  its 
convenient  proportions. 

In  a  line  of  the  finest  type  used  in  The  Tribune  there  are  35  of  these  ems. 
In  100  lines  there  are  3,500.  The  type  is  measured  from  a  schedule  of  100 
anes,  printed  thus :  • 


No. 
Lines. 
1 

No. 
Ems. 
.  35 

No. 
Lines. 
5  

No. 
Ems. 
175 

No. 
Lines. 
9  .. 

No. 
Ems. 
315 

No. 
Lines. 
13  

No. 
Ems. 
455 

2 

70 

6  

210 

10  

350 

14  

490 

8 

105 

7 

...  245 

11  

...385 

15 

525 

4... 

..140 

8... 

..280 

12... 

...420 

16... 

-.560 

And  so  on  from  16  up  to  100,  and  from  560  up  to  8,500.  Of  course  the 
schedule  consists  of  a  straight  column  of  100  lines,  the  above  being  broken 
into  four  pieces  to  save  space.  Now  a  compositor  hands  a  long  string  of 
yellow  slips  or  "takes"  pasted  together  to  the  measurer.  He  draws  a 
common  string  over  the  length  of  the  pasted  slips.  He  then  draws  the 
string  (that  is,  the  slips  as  measured  on  the  string)  over  the  printed  sched- 
ule, as  given  above.  As  each  hundred  lines  is  measured  on  the  string  he 
counts 

"One!"  "Two!"  "Three!"  "Four!"  "Five!"  "Six!"  "Seven!" 

That  is  seven  lengths  of  string,  or  700  lines.    Go  back  to  the  figurei 

pointed  above.    Look  at  the  figure  7  in  the  second  column,  headed  "  No. 

lines."     Opposite  the  7  you  find  the  figures  245.    Add  two  O's  to  the  245 

and  you  have  24,500  — the  exact  number  of  ems  contained  In  the  seven 


THE   COMPOSITION-BOOM.  473 

lengths  of  string.  If  you  have  nine  lengths,  go  to  the  figure  9,  and  you 
have  31,500  ems,  and  so  on  to  10,  11,  &c.  Of  course  what  is  left  o-ver  pi 
100  lines  is  readily  measured  on  the  schedule.  This  is  another  one  of  Tom 
Hooker's  inventions.  By  it  one  man  could  measure  the  week's  work  of 
600  type  setters  in  ten  hours,  and  it  would  hardly  be  possible  to  make  a 
mistake. 

I  have  said  that  there  are  fifty-five  compositors  in  these  rooms.  Count- 
ing assistants  and  stereotypers  there  are  over  seventy  persons  here.  There 
are  over  100  gas  burners.  The  ceilings  are  low  in  some  places,  and  though 
every  appliance  of  modern  ventilation  has  been  used,  the  rooms  are  ill 
ventilated.  With  over  100  gas  burners  and  a  hot  furnace  fire  in  the  stereo- 
type room,  the  thermometer,  during  the  bottoinless-pit  weather  of  July 
last,  frequently  at  midnight  stood  at  108,  and  once  reached  113.  This, 
with  the  antimonial  gas  escaping  from  the  stereotype  room,  would  have 
been  enough  to  kill  a  bluff  farmer,  but  the  pale  host  of  type  stickers  held 
their  own.  The  Tribune  compositors,  with  the  exception  of  a  half  dozen 
men  who  work  exclusively  by  daylight,  reach  the  office  about  1  p.  M.  Three 
or  four  hours  are  then  consumed  in  distributing  the  type  for  the  night's 
work.  From  five  to  six  they  drop  off  to  supper,  returning  about  ten  min- 
utes of  seven.  As  the  hour  of  seven  approaches  they  swarm  around  the 
copy  hooks  like  bees  about  a  sugar  cask  At  five  minutes  of  seven  the 
Chairman  of  the  office  shouts: 
"  Well,  it's  time  —  sail  in !  Who's  first  out  ?  " 

This  "  first  out "  is  an  important  matter.  It  takes  in  the  "  fattest "  sli^e 
of  copy  in  the  office,  and  this  frequently  turns  out  a  five  or  an  eight  dollar 
job,  in  one,  two,  or  three  hours.  The  "  first  out"  goes  from  one  number  to 
another  on  each  succeeding  night. 

"  Eighteen's  first  out !  Number  Eighteen,  come  up  to  the  bull  ring ! " 
shouts  the  Chairman. 

Eighteen  delicately  slips  his  "take  "  from  the  hook  and  drifts  to  his  case, 
amid  the  ironical  oh's  and  ah's  of  his  companions,  who  kindly  offer  him 
fabulous  sums  of  money  for  his  luck. 

"Number  Nineteen!"  cries  the  Chairman.  Nineteen  "snakes"  his 
take  from  the  hook. 

"  Number  Twenty ! "  and  Twenty  follows  suit,  and  thus  they  go  until 
every  man  is  supplied  with  copy.    The  men  lay  their  copy  on  their  cases, 
and  stand,  stick  in  hand,  but  not  a  type  is  picked  up  until  at  precisely  7 
o'clock,  when  the  Chairman  cries 
"Time!    S-1-i-n-g 'em !  " 

The  type  rattle  in  fifty -five  sticks  at  once,  and  for  ten  minutes  hardly 
anything  is  heard  but  the  steady  "  click,  click  "  of  the  meta)  letters  within 
the  steel  sticks. 

The  proof-room  bell  rings,  and  the  bell  boy  runs  up  the  tin  box,  and. 
draws  therefrom  a  proof  sheet. 
"  Proof  for  Number  — !  "  yells  the  boy. 

Some  droll  typo  remarks:  "Oh,  no,  that  can't  be — must  be  some  mis- 
take somewhere ! " 


474  LIFE  OF  HORACE   GREELET. 

As  No.  —  happens  to  be  a  notoriously  incorrect  compositor,  a  general 
laugh  follows.  No. — retorts  with  an  intimation  that  the  droll  typo  ia 
suffering  from  an  attack  of  the  jim-jams,  and  a  steady  stream  of  jokes  and 
sarcastic  allusions  follow,  until  some  witty  genius  says,  in  a  grave  voice. 

"Now  we'll  have  the  opening  chorus!"  accompanying  it  with  a  song, 
usually  chanted  by  a  brother  typo  when  on  a  spree,  and  another  round  of 
laughter  follows. 

"  Who's  got  9  G ! "  shouts  a  wiry  little  fellow,  adding,  sotto  voce,  "  Hang 
the  copy!  I  believe  three  weeks  at  a  writing-school  wouldn't  hurt 
Greeley ! " 

"  Hang  your  copy  on  the  hook  if  you  can't  read  it!  "  shouts  an  unsym- 
pathizing  companion. 

"Oh,  he  can  read  it  well  enough!  "  chimes  in  another.  "There's  a  fiit 
'take'  on  the  agate  hook,  and  he's  a  lay  in'  for  it  —  that's  what's  the 
matter!" 

Here  Captain  Holmes,  a  veteran  one-legged  typo,  opens  the  door,  ten 
minutes  late,  as  usual,  and  sails  for  his  case  like  a  weather-beaten  frigate. 
The  rattle  and  clatter  of  fifty-five  sticks  beating  a  tattoo  on  the  cases 
salute  him.  The  Captain  growls  like  a  boatswain  on  a  man-of-war,  then 
tosses  one  crutch  under  his  cases,  jerks  off  his  coat,  and  propped  on  his 
remaining  crutch,  rolls  up  his  shirtsleeves  with  the  majesty  of  an  Ajax  en 
dJihahilU.  He  shakes  up  the  few  type  remaining  in  his  case,  gets  his 
copy,  and  immediately  wants  to  know  if  "any  gentleman  has  any  lower 
case  agate  p's  to  give  out?" 

"  Come  here,  Captain,"  shouts  a  comrade,  and  the  Captain  stumps  off, 
and  returns  with  a  fist  full  of  letters,  which  he  dumps  in  his  p  box.  Then 
the  Captain  begins  composition.  In  ten  minutes  a  row  breaks  out  The 
Captain  discovers  a  nest  of  b's  in  his  p  box,  and  shouts  out, 

"Ah,  Number  Twenty,  what  did  you  give  me  when  I  went  to  your  case  ?" 

"  Gave  you  what  you  asked  for,  of  course  —  lower  case  agate  b's." 

"  Yu-ftee  dam !    I  asked  for  p's-for-putty,  and  you  gave  me  b's-for-butter !" 

As  the  Captain  is  known  as  an  inveterate  borrower,  a  roar  of  laughter 
breaks  from  the  whole  room,  and  the  Captain  subsides  into  a  low,  lion-like 
growl. 

Here  a  comrade  enters  the  room,  and  says  that  he  knows  nothing  about 
the  row,  but  he  will  bet  five  dollars  that  the  Captain  is  right,  for  he  never 
knew  him  to  be  wrong  in  his  life.  Derisive  cheers  follow,  and  the  Cap- 
tain's indignation  again  flames  forth,  and  gradually  subsides  into  the 
stereotyped  growl. 

A  long  silence,  dotted  with  the  "  click,  click  "  of  the  type,  follows.  At 
10  o'clock  Clement  comes  up  stairs,  and  designates  the  articles  to  go  in  on 
the  first  side  of  the  paper.  Sam  Walter,  the  old  and  trusty  night  foreman, 
whose  Chesterfieldian  qualities  have  endeared  him  to  every  printer  who  has 
stuck  a  type  in  The  Tribune  office  for  the  last  eighteen  years,  dumps  the 
type  in  the  form,  amid  much  tribulation  over  the  work  of  some  "  infernal 
blacksmith,"  who  has  corrected  nonpareil  type  with  minion,  and  the 
pages  slide  off  to  the  stereotyper's  room. 


"GOOD  SIGHT."  475 

Chesterfield  soaps  his  hands  with  an  hysteric  laugh,  because  the  form  has 
gone  in  in  good  time,  and  rushes  for  Oliver  Hitchcock's  coffee  and  cake 
saloon.  Dan  Kimball,  his  assistant,  rubs  his  bald  head  and  begs  a  fresh 
chew  of  tobacco.  Silence  again.  A  noise  from  the  stereotype  room  is 
heard.  At  first  you  think  it  a  female  spanking  an  undressed  urchin.  It 
is  the  "spat,  spat"  of  the  stereotypers'  brushes.  They  are  beating  the 
prepared  paper,  described  elsewhere,  on  the  face  of  the  type.  The  door 
of  the  composing  room  opens,  and  a  huge  basket,  with  a  large  sized  coffee 
kettle,  hanging  on  the  arm  of  a  venerable  Scotch  woman,  enters. 

"  Yere's  yer  coffee !"  yells  the  bell  boy. 

Sticks  are  dropped,  stools  are  overturned,  and  a  stampede  in  the  direc- 
tion of  the  huge  basket  ensues.  Old  Dodge,  with  the  exception  of  Cyrus 
Harmon  and  Billy  Newman,  the  oldest  compositor  in  the  office,  draws  a 
roll  of  bread  and  butter  from  his  overcoat  pocket,  mounts  a  stool,  and  for 
ten  minutes  masticates  his  food  over  an  old  copy  of  The  Boston  Inves- 
tigator. 

At  midnight  the  copy  gives  out.  Clement  is  sent  for,  and  asked  for  copy. 
He  has  none. 

"  Shall  I  let  off  a  couple  of  phalanxes  ?"  inquires  Kimball. 

"  No,  sir,"  is  the  reply ;  "  I  expect  a  four  column  telegraphic  report  of 
Stanton's  speech  at  Cleveland." 

"  Bogus  is  in  order.  Put  your  names  down  on  the  slate  as  fast  as  you're 
out  of  copy,"  cries  Kimball,  and  down  go  a  dozen  names.  When  copy 
gives  out  the  compositors  are  put  to  work  on  matter  never  used  in  the 
paper.  This  is  termed  "  bogus  matter."  The  office  allows  the  men  this 
privilege,  because  it  would  be  unjust  to  require  them  to  hang  around  the 
office  waiting  for  copy,  in  the  dead  hours  of  night,  without  appropriate 
remuneration.  By  2  A.  M.  Stanton's  speech  is  all  in.  The  men  are  divided 
into  seven  phalanxes,  which  are  let  off,  phalanx  after  phalanx,  as  their 
services  are  no  longer  needed. 

"  Have  you  got  '  good  night '  from  Washington  yet,  Clem  ?"  asks  Kim- 
ball. 

"Yes,  Jim  Young*  shut  up  an  hour  ago,  but  the  Associated  Press  is 
telegraphing  its  usual  mess  of  stuff  about  the  Land  Office  and  the  Statistical 
Bureau.  Let  off  four  phalanxes !" 

Kimball  shouts,  "  First,  third,  fifth,  and  seventh  phalanxes,  close  up  and 
slope !" 

The  wearied  typos  drop  their  sticks,  and  totter  down  the  iron  stairs.  At 
2.30  A.  M.  Dr.  Wood  comes  up  from  the  editorial  room,  and  tosses  a  blue 
tissue  sheet  of  paper  on  the  table,  with  the  words  "  Good  Night"  thereon. 

"No  more  copy!  Here's  a  proof  for  the  Correcting  Phalanx !"  cornea 
from  Sam  Walter,  and  the  work  of  the  typo  is  done. 

The  type  is  pitched  into  the  pages,  which  must  be  into  the  stereotype 
room  by  3  A.  M.,  for  the  paper  to  catch  the  mails,  and  after  a  hard  half 
hour's  sweating,  fretting,  swearing  and  tearing,  the  newspaper  ship  is 

*  The  Washington  correspondent. 


476  M¥E  OF  HOKACE  GEEELET. 

launched  for  the  day,  and  by  4  A.  M.  a  dull  rumbling  in  the  lower  regions 
announces  that  the  presses  are  masticating  paper  thoughts  and  ideas  that 
will  be  scattered  throughout  the  Union  before  the  morning  hour  again 
rolls  around. 

The  work  on  the  Semi  or  Weekly  Tribune  follows. 

The  Tribune  compositors  earn  from  $20  to  $35  per  week.  During  the 
war  bills  frequently  ran  up  to  $50  and  even  $70  per  week.  The  man  who 
set  the  "  display  head-lines,"  over  announcements  of  glorious  victories, 
occasionally  made  the  latter  sum  —  the  lines  measuring  by  ems  the  same 
as  the  body  of  the  type  below  them.  Common  Councilmen,  well  known 
authors,  generals,  editors,  and  ministers  have  sprouted  in  The  Tribune 
composing  rooms.  The  printers  who  formerly  stuck  type  at  the  side  of 
Horace  Greeley  have  died  out  of  the  office.  Horace,  himself,  though  a 
practical  printer,  rarely  visits  the  composing  room.  The  last  time  the 
writer  saw  him  at  work  in  the  composition-room  was  at  3  o'clock  in  the 
morning  following  President  Lincoln's  election,  when  he  ran  his  eye  over 
the  type  of  the  New  York  election  table  on  the  editorial  page,  and  sud- 
d.enly  cried  out : 

"  Here,  Sam,  bring  me  a  bodkin ;  some  infernal  fool  has  spelled  Allegany 
with  an  h !" 

And  though  the  pressmen  were  impatiently  clanging  the  bells  for  the 
forms,  Horace  deliberately  drew  a  jack-knife  from  his  pocket  and  dug  the  h 
out  of  Allegany  before  he  would  allow  the  form  to  go  down.  In  Henry  Clay 
times  Mr.  Greeley  occasionally  "  made  up  the  forms  "  of  the  paper  him- 
self.  It  was  rather  a  tough  job  on  election  nights,  when  the  news  of  a 
Whig  walloping  would  roll  in  the  office,  and  old  Major  French,  one  of 
his  compositors,  and  a  sturdy  Democrat,  would  lounge  around  the  "  make- 
up "  and  crow  over  the  Democratic  victory.  Greeley  would  quietly 
chuckle,  and  "  guess  that  the  boot  would  go  on  the  other  leg  next  time." 

As  a  rule,  thoroughly  competent  printers  have  better  judgment  and  more 
discriminating  newspaper  tact  than  editors  manufactured  out  of  collegiate 
graduates.  The  majority  of  the  printers  of  the  Tribune  office  are  to-day 
better  posted  on  general  news  matters  than  a  majority  of  The  Tribune 
editors.  When  will  newspaper  managers  learn  to  use  the  raw  material, 
lying  under  their  very  noses?  I  have  known  owners  of  journals  to  run 
from  one  end  of  the  country  to  the  other  in  a  vain  search  for  a  competent 
Managing  Editor,  when  little  fellows  setting  type  in  their  own  offices  were 
fully  able  and  competent  to  get  out  just  such  newspapers  as  were  wanted  in 
their  various  sections.  When  practical  printers  take  editorial  charge  of 
newspapers,  both  newspapers  and  printers  invariably  thrive ;  can  the  same 
be  said  of  collegiate  graduates  ? 

Mr.  Parton  visited  The  Tribune  office  one  morning  before 
day-light.  He  gives  a  graphic  description  of  it  as  it  then 
was: 


FOLDING   THE   TBIBUKE.  477 

We  are  in  The  Tribune's  press-room.  It  is  a  large,  low,  cellar-like  apart- 
ment,  uncoiled,  white-washed,  inky,  and  unclean,  with  a  vast  folding  table 
in  the  middle,  tall  heaps  of  dampened  paper  all  about,  a  quietly-running 
steam  engine  of  nine-horse  power  on  one  side,  twenty-five  inky  men  and 
boys  variously  em  ployed,  and  the  whole- brilliantly  lighted  up  by  jetsof  gas, 
numerous  and  flaring.  On  one  side  is  a  kind  of  desk  or  pulpit,  with  a 
table  before  it,  and  the  whole  separated  from  the  rest  of  the  apartment  by 
a  r«*il.  In  the  pulpit,  the  night  clerk  stands,  counts  and  serves  out  the 
papers,  with  a  nonchalant  and  graceful  rapidity,  that  must  be  seen  to  be 
appreciated.  The  regular  carriers  were  all  served  an  hour  ago ;  they  have 
folded  their  papers  and  gone  their  several  ways ;  and  early  risers,  two  miles 
off,  have  already  read  the  news  of  the  day.  The  later  newsboys,  now,  keep 
dropping  in,  singly,  or  in  squads  of  three  or  four,  each  with  his  money 
ready  in  his  hand.  Usually,  no  word  passes  between  them  and  the  clerk ; 
he  either  knows  how  many  papers  they  have  come  for,  or  they  show  him 
by  exhibiting  their  money ;  and  in  three  seconds  after  his  eye  lights  upon 
a  newly-arrived  dirty  face,  he  has  counted  the  requisite  number  of  papers, 
counted  the  money  for  them,  and  throws  the  papers  in  a  heap  into  the 
boy's  arms,  who  slings  them  over  his  shoulder  and  hurries  off  for  his  sup- 
ply of  Times  and  Heralds.  Occasionally  a  woman  comes  in  for  a  few 
papers,  or  a  little  girl,  or  a  boy  so  small  that  he  cannot  see  over  the  low 
rail  in  front  of  the  clerk,  and  is  obliged  to  announce  his  presence  and  his 
desires  by  holding  above  it  his  little  cash  capital  in  his  little  black  paw. 
In  another  part  of  the  press-room,  a  dozen  or  fifteen  boys  are  folding  papers 
for  the  early  mails,  and  folding  them  at  the  average  rate  of  thirty  a  minute. 
A  boy  has  folded  sixty  papers  a  minute  in  that  press-room.  Each  paper 
has  to  be  folded  six  times,  and  then  laid  evenly  on  a  pile ;  and  the  velocity 
of  movement  required  for  the  performance  of  such  a  minute's  work,  the 
reader  can  have  no  idea  of  till  he  sees  it  done.  As  a  feat,  nothing  known 
to  the  sporting  world  approaches  it.  The  huge  presses,  that  shed  six 
printed  leaves  at  -a  stroke,  are  in  deep  vaults  adjoining  the  press-room. 
They  are  motionless  now,  but  the  gas  that  has  lighted  them  during  their 
morning's  work  still  spurts  out  in  flame  all  over  them,  and  men  with  blue 
shirts  and  black  faces  are  hoisting  out  the  "forms"  that  have  stamped 
their  story  on  thirty  thousand  sheets.  The  vaults  are  oily,  inky,  and 
warm.* 

Instead  of  the  vast  folding-table  seen  twenty  years  ago  by 
Mr.  Parton,  we  should  now  find  a  number  of  folding-machines, 
"  fed  "  by  boys,  very  much  as  the  press  is  "  fed "  by  men. 
Into  one  of  these  machines  a  Tribune  enters  in  one  large  sheet, 
and  out  it  presently  drops,  folded  ready  for  the  carrier  or  for 
mailing.  The  immense  editions  of  The  Tribune  are  thus 
folded  in  an  incredibly  short  time.  Observing  the  wonderfully 

•Life  of  Horace  Greeley,  pp.  392-3. 


4T8  LIFE  OF   HORACE  QEEELET. 

rapid,  the  almost  miraculously  delicate,  exact  movements  of 
press  and  folding-machines,  one  can  hardly  help  being  impressed 
with  the  idea  that  they  are  living  beings,  possessed  of  minds; 
and  I  dare  say  that  Mr.  Fitzpatrick,  long  press  foreman,  so 
loves  "  the  old  machine,"  the  press,  that  he  has  often  found 
himself  musing  upon  the  question,  whether,  when  it  and  he 
shall  have  done  all  their  work  in  this  world,  they  shall  meet  in 
heaven;  and  if  not  what  he  is  to  do  with  himself? 

The  world  of  .New- York  in  the  main  has  only  to  do  with 
The  Tribune  counting-room  It  requires  great  business  ability 
and  tact  to  conduct  the  financial  affairs  of  a  daily  journal. 
The  disbursements  of  The  Tribune  frequently  reach  ten  thou- 
sand dollars  a  day,  and,  Mr.  Cummings  informs  us,  in  the 
articles  from  which  we  have  so  largely  quoted,  that  they  have 
exceeded  $1,000,000  a  year.  Transactions  are  had  with  per- 
sons in  all  portions  of  the  globe.  There  is  in  no  other  business 
with  so  great  a  variety  of  transactions.  Mr.  Samuel  Sinclair 
"  is  the  lever  which  keeps  all  these  things  in  perpetual  motion." 
Mr.  Sinclair  entered  the  office  early  in  the  reign  of  Mr.  McEl- 
rath,  at  a  salary  of  nine  dollars  a  week.  He  is  now  the  largest 
stockholder,  a  man  of  great  wealth.  Quiet,  modest,  he  has 
conducted  the  immense  and  varied  business  affairs  of  the  office 
for  years  with  most  notable  success  financially,  and  in  rare 
harmony  with  the  editorial  rooms.  For,  be  it  known,  there  is 
apt  to  be  irrepressible  conflict  between  the  counting-rooms  and 
the  editorial  rooms  of  a  great  journal.  The  heads  of  each  are 
liable  to  view  things  from  different  stand-points.4  "Will  it 
pay?"  is  a  natural  inquiry  of  the  business  manager.  "Is  it 
right?"  is  the  question  to  be  decided  by  the  great  editor.  It 

*I  recollect  that  when,  in  1868,  The  Chicago  Tribune  declined  to  join  in 
tiie  unreasonable,  fanatical  clamour  against  Senator  Trumbull  and  others 
who  had  refused  to  vote  for  the  impeachment  of  President  Johnson,  and 
when  salea  were  rapidly  falling  off  in  consequence,  Mr.  Alfred  Cowles, 
business  manager,  never  for  an  instant  flinched;  not  one  whit  more  than 
Horace  White  himself.  "  O,"  said  Cowles,  "  The  Chicago  Tribune  has 
lived  through  worse  storms  than  this ;  and  will  live  through  many  more. 
If  it  can't,  it  ought  to  die."  If  we  had  more  such  business  managers  as 
Samuel  Sinclair  and  Alfred  Cowles,  we  should  have  additions  to  the  num- 
ber of  great  journals. 


TRIBUNE  DEMOCRACY.  479 

requires  a  fine  business  man,  of  unusually  comprehensive 
mind,  and  of  unflinching  pluck,  to  percieve  ever  that  it  is  in 
the  long  run  profitable  for  a  great  journal  to  be  right.  In  Mr. 
McElrath  and  in  Mr.  Sinclair,  as  publishers  of  The  Tribune, 
Horace  Greeley  was  wisely  fortunate. 

A  great  day  in  the  establishment  of  The  Tribune  is  "  Weekly 
Day."  This  edition  of  the  paper  has  long  been  so  immense 
that  to  print,  fold,  and  mail  it,  taxes  all  the  capacity  of  the 
working  men  and  machinery  of  the  office.  When  Mr.  Parton 
made  his  extended  visit  to  The  Tribune  office,  the  edition  of 
the  Weekly  numberd  over  100,000  copies,  a  number  which  was 
afterwards  greatly  augmented.  "It  is  Thursday,"  he  says, 
"  the  day  of  The  Weekly  Tribune,  the  inside  of  which  began 
to  be  printed  at  seven  in  the  morning.  Before  the  day  closes 
the  whole  edition,  one  hundred  and  sixteen  thousand,  forty- 
eight  cart-loads,  will  have  been  printed,  folded,  wrapped, 
bundled,  bagged,  and  carried  to  the  post-office." 

A  fact  which  will  strike  any  one  upon  a  visit  to  The  Tribune 
office  is  what  I  will  call  its  democratic  management.  Here  is 
a  copy  of  a  notice  in  the  composition-room :  "  Gentlemen 
desiring  to  wash  and  soak  their  distributing  matter  will  please 
use  hereafter  the  metal  galleys  I  had  cast  for  the  purpose,  as 
it  is  ruinous  to  galleys  having  wooden  sides  to  keep  wet  type 
in  them  locked  up.  THOS.  N.  HOOKER."  Mr.  Parton  is  of 
opinion  that  it  took  the  world  an  unknown  number  of  thou- 
sand years  to  arrive  at  that  word  "gentlemen."  And  aftn 
wards,  commenting  upon  the  topic  of  this  paragraph,  he  saya 
with  great  beauty  and  truth: 

There  is  something  extremely  pleasing  in  the  spectacle  afforded  by  a 
large  number  of  strong  men  cooperating  in  cheerful  activity,  by  which 
they  at  once  secure  their  own  career,  and  render  an  important  service  to 
the  public.  Such  a  spectacle  The  Tribune  Building  presents.  At  present 
men  show  to  best  advantage  when  they  are  at  work;  we  have  not  yet 
learned  to  sport  with  grace  and  unmixed  benefit ;  and  still  further  are  we 
from  that  stage  of  developement  where  work  and  play  become  one.  But 
The  Tribune  Building  is  a  very  cheerful  place.  No  one  is  oppressed  or 
degraded ;  and,  by  the  minute  subdivision  of  labour  in  all  departments, 
there  is  seldom  any  occasion  for  hurry  or  excessive  exertion.  The  distinc- 
tions which  there  exist  between  one  man  and  another,  are  not  artificial, 


480  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELET. 

but  natural  and  necessary;  foreman  and  editor,  offlce-boy  and  head  clerk, 
if  they  converse  together  at  all,  converse  as  friends  and  equals ;  and  the 
posts  of  honour  a/re  posts  of  honour,  only  because  they  are  posts  of  diffi- 
culty. In  a  word,  the  republicanism  of  the  Continent  has  come  to  a  focus 
at  the  corner  of  Nassau  and  Spruce  streets.  There  it  has  its  nearest 
approach  to  practical  realization ;  thence  proceeds  its  strongest  expression. 

On  the  tenth  day  of  April,  1871,  The  Tribune  became  thirty 
years  of  age.     Upon  that  day,  it  contained  a  leading  article  by 
Mr.  Greeley,  which  gave  a  comprehensive  resumt  of  the  his 
tory  of  its  growth  from  the  dreary,  stormy  day  of  its  founding 
up  to  that  time.     The  article  should  be  here  reproduced: 

The  Daily  Tribune  was  first  issued  on  the  10th  of  April,  1841 ;  it  has 
therefore  completed  its  thirtieth,  and  to-day  enters  upon  its  thirty-first 
year.  It  was  originally  a  small  folio  sheet,  employing,  perhaps,  twenty 
persons  in  its  production ;  it  is  now  one  of  the  largest  journals  issued  in 
any  part  of  the  world,  containing  ten  to  fifteen  times  as  much  as  at  first, 
and  embodying  in  each  issue  the  labour  of  four  to  five  hundred  persons  as 
writers,  printers,  etc.,  etc.  Its  daily  contents,  apart  from  advertisements, 
would  make  a  fair  12mo  volume,  such  as  sells  from  the  bookstores  for  $1.25 
to  $1.50;  and  when  we  are  compelled  to  issue  a  supplement,  its  editorials, 
correspondence,  dispatches,  and  reports  (which  seldom  leave  room  for  any 
but  a  mere  shred  of  selections)  equal  in  quantity  an  average  octavo.  The 
total  cost  of  its  production  for  the  first  week  was  $525 ;  it  is  now  nearly 
$20,000  per  week,  with  a  constant,  irresistible  tendency  to  increase. 

Other  journals  have  been  established  by  a  large  outlay  of  capital,  and 
many  years  of  patient,  faithful  effort :  The  Tribune  started  on  a  very  small 
capital,  to  which  little  has  ever  been  added  except  through  the  abundance 
and  liberality  of  its  patrons.  They  enabled  it  to  pay  its  way  almost  from 
the  outset;  and,  though  years  have  intervened,  especially  during  our  great 
Civil  War,  when,  through  a  sudden  and  rapid  advance  in  the  cost  of  paper 
and  other  materials,  our  expenses  somewhat  exceeded  our  income,  yet, 
taking  the  average  of  these  thirty  years,  our  efforts  have  been  amply 
generously  rewarded,  and  the  means  incessantly  required  to  purchase 
expensive  machinery,  and  make  improvements  on  every  hand,  have  been 
derived  exclusively  from  the  regular  receipts  of  the  establishment.  Ren- 
dering an  earnest  and  zealous,  though  by  no  means  an  indiscriminate 
support,  for  the  former  half  of  its  existence  to  the  Whig,  and  through  the 
latter  half  to  the  Republican  Party,  The  Tribune  has  asked  no  favour  of 
either,  and  no  odds  of  any  man  but  that  he  should  pay  for  whatever  he 
choose  to  order,  whether  in  the  shape  of  subscriptions  or  advertisements. 
Holding  that  a  journal  can  help  no  party  while  it  requires  to  be  helped 
itself,  we  hope  so  to  deserve  and  retain  the  good  will  of  the  general  public 
that  we  may  be  as  independent  in  the  future  as  we  have  been  in  the  past. 

So  long  as  slavery  cursed  our  country,  this  journal  was  its  decided  and 


FAC-SIMILE  OF  MR.  GREELEY'S   PENMANSHIP. 


MR.  GREELEY'S  "CROTCHET."  481 

open,  though  not  reckless  adversary;  now  that  slavery  is  dead,  we  insist 
that  the  spirit  of  caste,  of  inequality,  of  contempt  for  the  rights  of  the 
coloured  races,  shall  be  buried  in  its  grave.  The  only  reason  for  theii 
existence  having  vanished,  it  is  logical  and  just  that  they  should  vanish 
also.  Since  the  substance  no  longer  exists,  the  shadow  should  promptly 
disappear. 

The  protection,  looking  to  the  developement  of  our  home  industry,  by 
duties  on  imports,  discriminating  with  intent  to  uphold  and  fortify  weak 
and  exposed  departments  thereof,  has  ever  been,  in  our  view,  the  most 
essential  and  beneficent  feature  of  a  true  national  policy.  Our  country 
lias  always  increased  rapidly  in  production,  in  wealth,  in  population,  and 
in  general  comfort,  when  protection  was  in  the  ascendant,  while  it  has 
been  cursed  with  stagnation,  paralysis,  commercial  revulsions,  and  wide- 
spread bankruptcies  under  the  sway  of  relative  free  trade.  This  journal 
Btood  for  protection  under  the  lead  of  Henry  Clay,  Daniel  Webster,  Walter 
Forward,  George  Evans,  Thomas  Corwin,  and  their  compeers ;  it  stands 
for  protection  to-day  as  heartily  as  it  did  then,  and  for  identical  reasons. 
It  asks  no  Free-trader  to  forego  his  economic  views  in  order  to  be  a  Repub- 
lican ;  it  insists  that  no  Protectionist  shall  be  bullied  out  of  his  convictions 
in  deference  to  the  harmony  of  the  party.  It  asks  no  more  than  it  con- 
cedes, and  will  be  satisfied  with  no  less.  If  the  Republican  Party  shall 
ever  be  broken  up  on  the  Tariff  Question,  it  will  take  care  that  the  resnor.- 
sibility  is  placed  where  it  belongs. 

Tile  editor  of  The  Tribune  was  also  its  publisher  and  sole  proprietor 
when  it  firsi  commended  itself  to  public  attention.  He  has  long  ago 
ceased  to  be  publisher,  and  is  now  but  one  among  twenty  proprietors.  As 
the  work  required  has  grown,  it  has  been  divided,  and  in  part  assigned  to 
others,  but  the  chief  direction  and  supervision  of  its  columns  has  been 
continued  in  his  hands,  and  is  likely  to  remain  there  so  long  as  his  strength 
shall  endure.  Half  his  life  has  been  devoted  to  this  journal,  the  former 
half  having  been  mainly  given  to  preparation  for  its  conduct;  and  now 
few  remain  who  held  kindred  positions  in  this  city  on  the  10th  of  April, 
1841.  His  only  editorial  assistant  then,  though  several  years  his  junior, 
was,  after  a  brilliant  independent  career,  suddenly  called  away  in  1869, 
leaving  behind  him  few  equals  in  general  ability;  and  of  those  who  aided 
in  the  issue  of  our  No.  1,  but  two  are  known  to  be  still  living,  and  are 
among  our  co-proprietors,  still  rendering  daily  service  in  the  establish- 
ment, and  rejoicing  in  the  possession  of  health  and  unfailing  strength. 
Ten  years  more,  and  these  three  will  probably  have  followed  their  asso- 
ciates already  departed.  But  The  Tribune,  we  fondly  trust,  will  survive 
and  flourish  after  we  shall  have  severally  deceased,  being  sustained 
by  the  beneficence  of  its  aims,  the  liberality  of  its  spirit,  and  the  generous 
appreciation  of  an  intelligent  and  discerning  people. 

There  are  many  who  will  think  they  find  here  the  conclusive 
evidence   of  Mr.    Greeley's   "crotchet."     He  gives  twice  as 
much  space  to  the  subject  of  "  the  developoment  of  our  home 
31 


482  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GEEELEY. 

industry,  by  duties  on  imports,"  as  to  the  subject  of  all  men's 
equality  before  the  law;  and  passes  without  mention  what  The 
Tribune  had  done  in  behalf  of  "lands  for  the  landless;"  the 
Pacific  railroad;  the  emancipation  and  the  elevation  of  Labour. 
It  will  have  to  be  admitted  that  with  Mr.  Greeley  "  Protection  " 
was  a  crotchet;  that  it  was  an  anomaly  in  his  general  philos- 
ophy as  to  government  and  human  rights ;.  that  in  all  things 
else  opposed  to  the  unrepublican  notion  of  "  paternal  govern- 
ment," herein  he  was  an  earnest  devotee  of  a  deduction  of  a 
general  principle,  which  principle  he  often  combatted  as 
erroneous  and  vicious. 

—  We  see,  in  reading  the  foregoing  article,  at  a  single  glance, 
the  history,  in  dim  outline,  of  The  Tribune  during  a  period  of 
thirty  years.  This  embraced  an  era  of  remarkable  events;  of 
wonderful  progress;  of  the  triumph  of  many  great  ideas. 
The  facilities  of  trade  and  commerce  were  during  this  period 
vastly  increased.  When  Mr.  Greeley  founded  The  Tribune  it 
would  have  taken  him  longer  to  go  to  Chicago,  than  in  1871 
it  would  have  taken  him  to  go  to  Sun  Francisco..  The  tele- 
graph had  been  invented,  and  its  marvels  come  to  be  as 
common  as  the  sunshine.  Cheap  postage  had  become  a  prac 
tical  reality.  American  slavery  had  been  abolished.  .Revolu- 
tions had  occurred  in  Europe,  resulting  in  benefits  to  the 
people.  The  masses  of  his  own  countrymen  had  placed  them 
selves  on  a  high  plane  of  intelligence  and  morality.  The 
practical  enjoyment  of  religious  freedom  had  .been  widely 
extended.  Genuine  democracy  had  won  many  signal  victories; 
error  and. wrong  in  government  and  society  had  received  not  a 
few  memorable  defeats.  For  millions  of  mankind  great  good 
had  been  accomplished. 

For  the  accomplishment  of  all  the  positive  good;  for  the 
eradication  of  the  evils  which  have  passed  away,  The  New- 
York  Tribune  laboured,  in  season  and  out  of  season.  JN'ot  a 
struggling  people  anywhere  rising  against  injustice  and  oppres- 
sion, but  found  a  sympathetic  and  a  working  friend  in  Horace 
Greeley  and  his  journal.  Whosoever  it  was  that  sought  to  do 
good  was  sure  to  find  an  efficient  ally  in  The  Tribune;  and 


MR.  GREELEY'S  EDITORIAL  GENIUS:  483 

men  who  undertook  to  accomplish  evil  were  sure  to  find  in 
that  journal  stern  and  steady  opposition.  Whoever  seeks  a 
faithful  daguerreotype  of  the  progress  of  mankind  during  the 
years  which  have  passed  since  the  founding  of  The  Tribune 
will  find  it  in  the  columns  of  that  newspaper.  I  do  not  here 
gpeak  of  the  mere  publication  of  events  as  they  occurred ;  of 
mere  journalistic  enterprise.  I  mean  to  say  that  The  Tribime 
sympathized  with  every  advance  movement,  and  was  part  and 
parcel  of  it;  that  the  victories  of  philanthropy,  of  truth,  of 
justice,  of  human  rights  have  been  also~triumphs  of  the  jour- 
nal founded  by  Horace  Greeley.  The  victories  of  peace  are  no 
less  renowned  than  those  of  war.  A  history  of  all  that  Las 
contributed  to  the  welfare  of  the  people  of  all  lands,  since  the 
tenth  day  of  April,  1841,  is  also  a  history  of  The  New- York 
Tribune. 

As  I  shall  not  have  occasion  to  devote  another  chapter  to  a 
glance  at  Tribune  history  in  detail,  I  may  here,  so  far  as  this 
special  portion  of  Mr.  Greeley's  life  is  concerned,  bid  it  a  final 
farewell,  though  at  the  risk,  in  what  I  purpose  now  to  say,  of 
referring  to  some  matters  which  have  been  before  treated  of  in 
this  volume,  and  others  which  it  may  be  necessary  again  to 
mention. 

Though  Horace  Greeley  was  many  times  during  the  course 
of  his  life  painfully  deceived  by  individuals  in  whom  he  placed 
confidence,  and  this  in  business  as  well  as  in  political  affairs, 
his  judgment  of  men  who  could  best  aid  him  in  the  conduct 
of  his  journal,  of  the  principles  by.which  it  should  be  guided, 
the  ends  which  it  should  seek  to  accomplish  in  all  its  multiform 
departments, —  in  all  these  matters  his  judgment  appears  to 
have  been  the  inspiration  of  unerring  genius.  This  might 
appear  to  be  actually  demonstrated  by  the  magnificent  result 
of  his  editorial  life — The  !New-York  Tribune.  It  will  not  be 
claimed  that  he  founded  a  journal  which  is  in  every  respect,  or 
in  many  respects,  superior  to  others  in  this  country  and  in 
Europe.  There  are  several  American  journals,  for  example, 
which  have  been  more  profitable  than  The  Tribune.  There  are 
several  which,  year  in  and  year  out,  have  not  been  behind  it  in 
the  presentation  of  current  news.  There  are  some  whose 


484:  UFE   OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

"editorial  page"  shows  equal  ability  and  versatility:  as  much 
genius,  as  much  sagacity,  as  much  acumen.  I  think  some  of 
the  strongest,  most  brilliant  editorials  which  American  jour- 
nalism has  produced  have  appeared  in  The  Chicago  Times 
newspaper.  And  it  may  be  doubted  whether  Mr.  Greeley  was 
more  successful,  as  a  writer  of  editorials,  than  Charles  Ham- 
mond, long  of  The  Cincinnati  Gazette,  or  Dr.  Charles  H.  Ray, 
for  several  years  of  The  Chicago  Tribune,  afterwards  of  The 
Evening  Post  of  the  same  city. 

Nevertheless,  there  has  been  no  journal  of  preeminent  gen- 
eral ability,  which  has  had  the  marked  individuality  of  The 
New- York  Tribune.  There  are  thousands  of  persons  who  know 
of  The  Herald  who  never  heard  of  Mr.  Bennett.  Every  school- 
boy, every  grandmother  of  Christendom  had  learned  much  of 
Horace  Greeley  before  he  was  a  candidate  for  the  chief  office 
of  his  country.  The  Tribune  had  the  most  friends  and  the 
most  valuable  enemies  of  any  journal  in  the  world.  They  who 
etone  the  prophets,  die,  not  the  prophets.  Other  journals  were 
devoted  first  of  all  to  themselves;  The  Tribune  to  the  welfare 
of  the  people.  No  other  of  our  great  journals  has  equalled  it 
in  Reform,  nor  approached  it  in  the  strength  and  the  mighty 
heartiness  with  which  it  sympathized  with  struggling  Human- 
ity. The  crumbling  ruins  of  bad  institutions,  fallen  in  their 
warfare  with  right  and  justice,  will  be  found  to  contain  more 
and  more  destructive  projectiles  of  The  Tribune  than  were  sent 
forth  from  any  of  the  other  great  guns  of  journalism.  "Here 
is  a  newspaper,"  said  John  Bright  in  the  British  House  of 
Commons,  exhibiting  a  copy  of  The  New- York  Tribune,  "ad- 
vocating great  principles,  and  conducted  in  all  respects  with 
the  greatest  propriety — a  newspaper  in  which  he  found  not  a 
syllable  that  he  might  not  put  on  his  table  and  allow  his  wife 
anJ  daughter  to  read  with  satisfaction."  The  Tribune  greatly 
aided  to  destroy  more  than  one  evil  in  English  polity.  The 
abuses  it  first  assailed  among  our  great  journals  in  American 
law,  and  custom,  and  society,  are  very  numerous.  Excessive 
mileage,  high  postage,  the  franking  abuse,  slavery,  unjust  legal 
disabilities  of  men,  unjust  proscription  of  them,  the  rule  of 
hatred, — whence  have  come  such  heavy  and  persistent  blows 


VITALITY   OF   GREAT  JOUliNALS.  485 

against  these  and  other  wrongs  and  abuses  as  from  The  Tri- 
bune ?  And  if  the  farmers  of  our  country,  our  workingrnen, 
our  factory  boys  and  girls  are  more  enlightened  than  they 
were,  and  animated  by  more  noble  aims,  where  in  journalism 
did  they  receive  so  much  to  teach  and  guide  them  as  in  the 
paper  founded  by  Horace  Greeley  ?  It  has  been  the  wisest 
exponent  of  the  cause  of  Labour.  There  has  been  no  states- 
man, there  has  been  no  party,  so  faithfully  representative  of 
The  People, — of  their  incorruptible  integrity,  of  their  virtue, 
ot  their  longing  for  improvement  and  for  progress, — as  his 
newspaper. 

It  was  a  beautiful  pride  of  his,  therefore,  which  caused  him 
to  desire  to  be  chiefly  remembered  by  posterity  as  the  founder 
of  The  New- York  Tribune. 

And  he  will  be. 

This  too,  as  one  of  the  natural  growths  of  his  genius, 
joined,  if  I  may  so  speak,  with  a  law  of  journalism.  In  the 
teeming  forests  of  South  Africa,  the  stateliest  tree,; — that 
which  is  greater  in  girth  and  towers  high  above  all  its  com- 
peers,—  is  the  mowana.  This  sublime  pride  of  the  forest  has 
a  vitality  which  is  well  nigh  indestructible.  Dr.  Livingstone 
says  of  it:  "  No  external  injury,  not  even  a  fire,  can  destroy 
this  tree  from  without;  nor  can  any  injury  be  done  from 
within,  as  it  is  quite  common  to  find  it  hollow.  Nor  does  cut- 
ting down  exterminate  it;  for  I  saw  instances  in  Angola  in 
which  it  continued  to  grow  in  length  after  it  was  lying  on  the 
ground."  A  great  journal  seems  to  have  the  almost  imperish- 
able vitality  of  the  mowana.  For  this  we  shall,  doubtless, 
some  day  discover  the  reason.  It  may  be  because  of  the  great- 
ness of  the  journal.  Even  great  animals  live  long.  What- 
ever may  be  the  reason,  there  are  facts  plenty  in  support  of 
my  opinion.  The  death  of  James  Gordon  Bennett  did  not 
stop  The  Herald  for  an  instant,  nor  change  the  great  character 
which  he  had  finally  given  it.  And  it  would,  no  doubt,  have 
been  substantially  the  same  if  he  had  had  no  son.  The  Louis- 
ville-Courier-Journal  had  in  Mr.  George  D.  Prentice  an  editor 
of  unique  genius;  but  no  one  can  safely  urge  that  he  was  more 
brilliant,  more  witty,  more  genial  than  is  Mr.  Watterson,  at 


486 


LIFE   OF    HORACE   GREKLIA'. 


this  time  editor  of  that  journal.  The  Chicago  Tribune  has 
stood  the  assaults  of  power,  of  money,  of  party,  of  devouring 
fire  and  flame,  and  gives  every  evidence  of  living,  with  even 
increased  influence,  after  many  assailing  powers  and  parties 
shall  have  followed  their  predecessors  to  the  tomb.  The  Lon- 
don Times  is  stronger  than  the  British  aristocracy;  it  will  long 
outlive  the  British  monarchy. 

Into  The  New- York  Tribune  Horace  Greeley  breathed  the 
living  soul  of  his  benignant  genius:  a  constant  inspiration  to 
his  successor, — the  one  of  his  own  choice, — who  has  already 
won  new  triumphs  in  behalf  of  popular  enlightenment,  of 
enterprising,  independent  journalism,  animated  by  a  generous 
philanthropy,  showing  that  the  journal  still  labours  for  the 
moral,  social,  political  good  of  the  people,  pursuing  and  im- 
proving the  way  of  its  illustrious  founder.  I  need  hardly 
add,  I  trust,  that  this  is  not  said  in  compliment  to  him  who 
succeeds  the  Great  Editor,  but  in  demonstration  of  the  edito- 
rial judgment  of  Horace  Greeley,  and  of  the  inextinguishable 
vitality  of  independent  journalism. 


JAMES   GORDON   BENNETT.  JR. 


CHAPTER    XXVI. 

THE  AUTHOR  OF  BOOKS. 

Mr.  Greeley  in  Permanent  Literature  —  His  Labours  in  Political  Manuals 
—Edits  a  Life  of  Henry  Clay  — "Hints  Towards  Reforms  "  —  "Glances 
at  Europe"  —  "Overland  Journey  to  California" — "The  American 
Conflict"  —  A  "Work  Upon  Political  Economy — "Recollections  of  a 
Busy  Life"— "What  I  Know  of  Farming"  — Estimate  of  Mr.  Greelcy 
as  an  Author. 

LET  us  now  briefly  consider  the  facts  of  Mr.  Greeley's  life 
which  show  his  connection  with  the  permanent  literature  of 
his  country.  I  here  mean,  simply,  his  writings  which  have 
taken  the  form  of  books,  as  distinguished  from  his  writings 
in  journalism.  That  which  now  constitutes  a  considerable 
proportion  of  the  matter  of  works  of  which  Mr.  Greeley  was 
the  author  did,  indeed,  originally  appear  in  The  Tribune  or  in 
other  journals.  He  also  wrote  a  great  deal  for  his  own  journal, 
for  others,  for  magazines,  addresses,  lectures,  letters,  which 
might  properly  and  profitably  be  collected  into  books  that 
might  fairly  receive  the  favourable  judgment  of  criticism  and 
the  considerate  approval  of  the  world  of  letters.  But  at  this 
time  we  can,  of  course,  only  consider  him  as  an  author  by  the 
writings  which  he  himself  composed  as  books,  or  supervised 
in  that  form. 

We  have  seen  that  Mr.  Greeley  very  early  in  life  became 
noted  as  a  political  statistician.  In  his  "Recollections  of 
Horace  Greeley,"  published  in  The  Galaxy  magazine  for  March, 
1873,  Mr.  Thurlow  Weed  says  that  The  New-Yorker — Mr. 
Greeley's  first  journal — was  distinguished  not  only  by  its  judi- 
cious and  interesting  selections,  but  "  remarkable  for  the  extent 
and  accuracy  of  its  political  statistics."  It  might  appear  that 
Mr.  Greeley  had  a  genius  for  political  statistics.  He  was 
always  at  home  with  election  returns,  and  probably  there  was 
not  a  year  of  his  life,  after  he  arrived  at  manhood,  when  he 

(487) 


488  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GKEELET. 

could  not  tell,  on  call,  without  reference  to  book  or  table,  the 
exact  vote  of  every  State  in  the  Union  at  the  most  recent  elec- 
tion, and  of  very  many  of  the  Congress  Districts,  and  even  of 
counties.  He  recollected  not  only  on  which  side  the  different 
States  and  Districts  had  voted,  but  exactly  how  they  had  voted. 

He  compiled  The  Whig  Almanac,  afterwards  called  The 
Tribune  Almanac,  long  before  he  became  generally  known  as 
a  journalist,  giving  it  a  value  in  respect  of  accurate  political 
intelligence  and  statistics  before  quite  unknown.  The  work, 
afterwards  mainly  done  by  others,  has  grown  into  the  most 
complete  and  valuable  compendium  of  political  facts  and 
figures  that  we  have.  Akin  to  this  was  "  A  Political  Text- 
Book  for  1860,"  compiled  by  Mr.  Greeley  and  Mr.  John  F. 
Cleveland.  The  design  of  the  book  \vas  to  present,  in  a  com- 
pact and  convenient  form,  the.  more  important  facts,  votes, 
resolves,  letters,  speeches,  reports,  and  other  documents,  eluci- 
dating the  political  contest  of  that  year.  It  also  contained 
many  tables  of  election  returns.  I  believe  it  was  quite  gener- 
ally quoted  as  authority  by  speakers  and  writers  of  all  parties 
during  the  campaign, — best  test  of  merit  in  a  work  of  that 
character.  But  long  before  this  Mr.  Greeley  had  published  a 
number  of  "  Tracts  on  the  Tariff,"  much  of  the  substance  of 
which  was  afterwards  embraced  in  his  work  upon  Political 
Economy. 

In  1852  he  edited  Sargent's  Life  of  Henry  Clay,  adding 
little,  however,  to  the  author's  narrative,  besides  an  account 
of  the  proceedings  of  Congress  on  the  occasion  of  Mr.  Clay's 
death  and  funeral.  His  description  of  his  own  last  interview 
with  his  most  admired  and  beloved  statesman  is  worthy  of 
insertion: 

"Learning  from  others  how  ill  and  feeble  he  was,  I  had  not  intended  to 
call  upon  him,  and  remained  two  days  under  the  same  roof  without  asking 
permission  to  do  so.  Meantime,  however,  he  was  casually  informed  of  my 
being  in  Washington,  and  sent  me  a  request  to  call  at  his  room.  I  did  so, 
and  enjoyed  a  half  hour's  free  and  friendly  conversation  with  him,  the 
saddest  and  the  last!  His  state  was  even  worse  than  I  feared;  he  was 
already  emaciated,  a  prey  to  a  severe  and  distressing  cough,  and  com- 
plained of  spells  of  difficult  breathing.  I  think  no  physician  could  have 
judged  him  likely  to  live  two  months  longer.  Yet  hia  iiimd  was 


"GLANCES  AT  EUROPE."  489 

unclouded  and  brilliant  as  ever,  liis  aspirations  for  his  country's  welfare 
as  ardent;  and,  though  all  personal  ambition  had  long  been  banished,  his 
interest  in  the  events  and  impulses  of  the  day  was  nowise  diminished, 
He  listened  attentively  to  all  I  had  to  say  of  the  repulsive  aspects  and 
revolting  features  of  the  Fugitive  Slave  Law  and  the  necessary  tendency 
of  its  operation  to  excite  hostility  and  alienation  on  the  part  of  our 
Northern  people,  unaccustomed  to  Slavery,  and  seeing  it  exemplified  only 
in  the  brutal  arrest  and  imprisonment  of  some  humble  and  inoffensive 
I  negro  whom  they  had  learned  to  regard  as  a  neighbour.  I  think  I  may 
,  without  impropriety  say  that  Mr.  Clay  regretted  that  more  care  had  not 
been  taken  in  its  passage  to  divest  this  act  of  features  needlessly  repul- 
sive to  Northern  sentiment,  though  he  did  not  deem  any  change  in  its 
provisions  now  practicable." 

In  the  preface  to  the  volume,  "Hints  Towards  Reforms," 
Mr.  Greeley  intimates  that  it  will  probably  be  his  first  and 
last  appearance  as  an  author.  I  have  already  spoken  of  this 
work  at  some  length  in  preceding  pages.  A  number  of  extracts 
therefrom  also  appear  in  the  Appendix  to  this  volume.  It 
will  he  found  a  valuable  study  to  those  who  would  have  a 
thorough  knowledge  of  the  constant  growth  in  power  and 
versatility  of  Mr.  Greeley's  mind  and  the  vast  improvement 
he  made  in  the  art  of  composition. 

TO 
THE  GENEROUS,  THE  HOPEFUL,  THE  LOVING, 

WHO 

FIRMLY    AND    JOYFULLY    BELIEVING    IN    THE    IMPARTIAL 
AND   BOUNDLESS   GOODNESS   OF  OUR  FATHER, 

TRUST 

THAT    THE    ERRORS,  THE    CRIMES,   AND    THE    MISERIES, 
WHICH    HAVE    LONG    RENDERED    EARTH    A    HELL, 
SHALL  YET  BE  SWALLOWED  UP  AND  FORGOT- 
TEN, IN  A  FAR   EXCEEDING  AND  UN- 
MEASURED REIGN  OF  TRUTH, 
PURITY,    AND    BLISS, 

THIS   VOLUME 

IS  RESPECTFULLY   AND   AFFECTIONATELY   INSCRIBED, 
BY 

THE  AUTHOR 

Such  is  the  dedication  of  Horace  Greeley's  first  book. 
Only  a  year  afterwards,  "Glances  at  Europe"  was  pub- 
lished.    There  have  been  few  books  of  travel  more  original,  or 


490  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

more  interesting  than  tins.  I  have  added  largely  to  the  inter- 
est  of  this  volume  by  many  extracts  from  it,  in  the  chapter 
which  treats  of  its  author's  first  visit  to  Europe.  One  will 
there  find  very  little  of  the  npper-ten  of  Europe,  but  I  know 
not  where  one  will  elsewhere  procure  in  such  small  space  more 
accurate^  pictures  of  the  people  or  wiser  suggestions  for  their 
good  and  their  progress.  Neither  do  I  know  of  any  other 
work  of  travels  in  Europe  by  an  American  author,  wherein  it 
is  so  T>lainlv  manifest  that  the  traveller  returns  to  his  native 

X  v 

land  prouder  of  it,  more  earnestly  devoted  to  it  because  of  its 
better  recognition  of  man  as  man.  It  is  rare  that  Europe 
intensifies  the  republicanism  of  Americans.  But  Horace  Gree- 
ley  was  so  wholly  one  of  the  people  that  in  Europe  or  else- 
where he  ever  estimated  "  fuss  and  feathers  "  at  their  proper 
value. 

Mr.  Greeley's  next  work  was  also  a  volume  of  travels — 
his  "Overland  Journey  to  California  in  1859."  This,  like 
"  Glances  at  Europe,"  consisted  of  letters  originally  con- 
tributed to  The  Tribune.  The  "  inarch  of  civilization,"  herein 
so  greatly  accelerated  by  his  own  influence,  as  well  exerted 
through  this  volume  as  in  other  ways,  has  made  much  of  the 
work  appear  already  like  a  relic  of  antiquity.  It  is  as  such 
that  it  may  be  studied  with  profit  and  read  with  singular 
interest.  The  historian  of  America  who  shall  write  in  1959 
will  find  in  the  volume  which  we  are  considering  a  richer  mine 
of  information  than  any  its  author  discovered  of  gold  in  all 
his  travels.  Nevertheless,  I  beg  respectfully  to  recommend  to 
my  great-great-great-grandchildren  the  reading  of  the  "  Over- 
land Journey  "  in  preference  to  the  formal  history  of  the  early 
settlement  of  the  Rocky  Mountain  region,  as  equally  authentic 
and  far  more  lively. 

The  greatest  work  of  Mr.  Greeley  as  an  author  is  his  history 
of  the  war  of  the  rebellion  in  the  United  States.  It  is  entitled 
"The  American  Conflict:  A  History  of  the  Great  Rebellion 
in  the  United  States  of  America,  1860-'65:  Its  Causes,  Inci- 
dents, and  Results:  Intended  to  Exhibit  Especially  its  Moral 
and  Political  Phases,  with  the  Drift  and  Progress  of  American 
Opinion  respecting  Human  Slavery  from  1776  to  the  Close  of 


"THE   AMERICAN   CONFLICT."  491 

the  War  for  the  Union."     He  has  described  with  much  detail 
the  manner  in  which  this  work  was  composed: 

And  now  came  the  Presidential  contest  of  1860,  closely  followed  by 
Secession  and  Civil  War,  whereof  I  had  no  thought  of  ever  becoming  the 
historian.  In  fact,  not  till  that  War  was  placed  on  its  true  basis  of  a 
struggle  for  liberation,  and  not  conquest,  by  President  Lincoln's  suc- 
cessive Proclamations  of  Freedom,  would  I  have  consented  to  write  its 
history.  Not  till  I  had  confronted  the  rebellion  as  a  positive,  desolating 
force,  right  here  in  New-York,  at  the  doors  of  earnest  Republicans,  in  the 
hunting  down  and  killing  of  defenceless,  fleeing  Blacks,  in  the  burning 
of  the  Coloured  Orphan  Asylum,  and  in  the  mobbing  and  firing  of  The 
Tribune  office,  could  I  have  been  moved  to  delineate  its  impulses,  aims, 
progress,  and  impending  catastrophe. 

A  very  few  days  after  the  national  triumph  at  Gettysburgh,  with  the 
kindred  and  almost  simultaneous  successes  of  General  Grant  in  the  cap- 
ture of  Vicksburgh,  and  General  Banks  in  that  of  Port  Hudson,  with  the 
consequent  suppression  of  the  (so  called)  "  Riots "  in  this  city,  I  was 
visited  by  two  strangers,  who  introduced  themselves  as  Messrs.  Newton 
and  O.  D.  Case,  publishers,  from  Hartford,  and  solicited  me  to  write  the 
History  of  the  Rebellion.  I  hesitated;  for  my  labours  and  responsibilities 
were  already  most  arduous  and  exacting,  yet  could  not,  to  any  considera- 
ble extent,  be  transferred  to  others.  The  compensation  offered  would  be 
.iberal,  in  case  the  work  should  attain  a  very  large  sale,  but  otherwise 
quite  moderate.  I  finally  decided  to  undertake  the  task,  knowing  \^11 
that  it  involved  severe,  protracted  effort  on  my  part;  and  I  commenced 
upon  it  a  few  weeks  later,  after  collecting  such  materials  as  were  then 
accessible.  I  hired  for  my  workshop  a  room  on  the  third  floor  of  the  new 
Bible  House,  on  Eighth  street  and  Third  and  Fourth  avenues,  procured 
the  requisite  furniture,  hired  a  secretary,  brought  thither  my  materials, 
and  set  to  work.  Hither  I  repaired,  directly  after  breakfast  each  week-, 
day  morning,  and  read  and  compared  the  various  documents,  official 
reports,  newspaper  letters,  etc.,  etc.,  that  served  as  materials  for  a  chapter, 
while  my  secretary  visited  libraries  at  my  direction,  and  searched  out 
material  among  my  documents  and  elsewhere.  The  great  public  libraries 
of  New- York, —  Society,  Historical,  Astor,  and  Mercantile  —  all  cluster 
around  the  Bible  House ;  the  two  last  named  being  within  a  bowshot.  I 
occasionally  visited  either  of  them,  in  personal  quest  of  material  other- 
wise inaccessible.  When  I  had  the  substance  of  my  next  chapter  pretty 
fairly  in  mind,  I  began  to  compose  that  chapter;  having  often  several 
authorities  conveniently  disposed  around  me,  with  that  on  which  I  prin- 
cipally relied  lying  open  before  me.  I  oftener  wrote  out  my  first  draft, 
merely  indicating  extracts  where  such  were  to  be  quoted  at  some  length ; 
leaving  these  to  be  inserted  by  my  secretary  when  he  came  to  transcribe 
my  text ;  but  I  sometimes  dictated  to  my  secretary,  who  took  short-hand 
notes  of  what  I  said,  and  wrote  them  out  at  his  leisure.  My  first  chapter 
was' thus  composed  at  one  sitting,  after  some  days  had  been  given  to  the 


492  LIFE  OF   HOKACE  GREELEY, 

arrangement  of  materials;  but,  usually,  two  days,  or  even  three,  were 
given  to  the  composition  of  each  of  the  longer  chapters,  after  I  had  pre- 
pared and  digested  its  material.  Our  rule  was  to  lock  the  door  on  resum- 
ing composition,  and  decline  all  solicitations  to  open  it  till  the  day's 
allotted  task  had  been  finished ;  and  this  was  easy  while  my  "  den  "  was 
known  to  very  few ;  but  that  knowledge  was  gradually  diffused ;  and  more 
and  more  persons  found  excuses  for  dropping  in ;  until  I  was  at  length 
subject  to  daily,  and  even  more  frequent,  though  seldom  to  protracted, 
interruptions.  I  think,  however,  that  if  I  should  ever  again  undertake 
diich  a  labour,  I  would  allow  the  location  of  my  "  den  "  to  be  known  to 
but  one  person  at  The  Tribune  office,  who  should  be  privileged  to  knock 
at  its  door  in  cases  of  extreme  urgency,  and  I  would  have  that  door  open 
to  no  one  beside  but  my  secretary  and  myself.  Even  my  proof-sheets 
should  await  me  at  The  Tribune  office,  whither  I  always  repaired,  to  com- 
mence a  day's  work  as  Editor,  after  finishing  one  as  Author  at  the  "den." 
A  chapter  having  been  fairly  written  out  or  transcribed  by  my  secretary, 
while  I  was  "  reading  up  "  for  another,  I  carefully  revised  and  sent  it  to 
the  stereotyper,  who  sent  me  his  second  and  third  proofs,  which  were 
successively  corrected  before  the  pages  were  ready  to  be  cast.  Sometimes, 
the  discovery  of  new  material  compelled  the  revision  and  recast  of  a 
chapter  which  had  been  passed  as  complete.  And,  though  the  material 
was  very  copious,  —  more  so,  I  presume,  than  that  from  which  the  history 
of  any  former  war  was  written,  —  it  was  still  exceedingly  imperfect  and 
contradictory.  For  instance :  when  I  came  to  the  pioneer  Secession  of 
South  Carolina,  I  wished  to  study  it  in  the  proceedings  and  debates  of  her 
Legislature  and  Convention  as  reported  in  at  least  one  of  her  own  jour- 
nals; and  of  these  I  found  but  a  single  file  preserved  in  our  city  (at  the 
Society  Library),  though  four  years  had  not  yet  expired  since  that  Seces- 
sion occurred.  A  year  later,  I  probably  could  not  have  found  one  at  all. 
Of  the  score  or  so  of  speeches  made  by  Jefferson  Davis,  often  from  cars, 
while  on  his  way  from  Mississippi  to  assume  at  Montgomery  the  Presi- 
dency of  the  Confederacy,  I  found  but  two  condensed  reports ;  and  one  of 
these,  I  apprehend,  was  apocryphal.  In  many  cases,  I  found  officers 
reported  killed  in  battles  whom  I  afterward  found  fighting  in  subsequent 
battles ;  whence  1  conclude  that  they  had  not  been  killed  so  dead  as  they 
might  have  been.  Some  of  the  errors  into  which  I  was  thus  led  by  my 
authorities  were  not  corrected  till  after  my  work  was  printed ;  when  the 
gentlemen  thus  conclusively  disposed  of  began  to  write  me,  insisting  that, 
though  desperately  wounded  at  the  battle  in  question,  they  had  decided 
not  to  give  up  the  ghost,  and  so  still  remained  in  the  land  of  embodied 
rather  than  that  of  disembodied  souls.  Their  testimony  was  so  direct  and 
pointed  that  I  was  constrained  to  believe  it,  and  to  correct  page  after  page 
accordingly.  I  presume  a  few,  even  yet,  remain  consigned  to  the  shades 
in  my  book,  who  nevertheless,  to  this  day,  consume  rations  of  beef  and 
pork  with  most  unspiritual  regularity  and  self-satisfaction.  There  doubt- 
less remain  some  other  errors,  though  I  have  corrected  many;  and,  as  I 
have  stated  many  more  particulars  than  my  rivals  in  the  same  field  have 


"THE  AICERICAN  COOT-HCM'."  493 

csually  done,  it  is  probable  that  my  work  originally  embodied  more  errors 
of  fact  or  incicbnt  than  almost  any  other. 

Yet  "The  American  Conflict"  will  be  consulted,  at  least  by  historians, 
and  I  shall  be  judged  by  it,  after  most  of  us  now  living  shall  have  mingled 
with  the  dust.  An  eminent  antagonist  of  my  political  views  has  pro- 
nounced it  "  the  fairest  one-sided  book  ever  written";  but  it  is  more  than 
that.  It  is  one  of  the  clearest  statements  yet  made  of  the  long  train  ofj 
causes  which  led  irresistibly  to  the  war  for  the  Union,  showing  why  that 
war  was  the  natural  a,nd  righteous  ooncaquence  of  the  American  people's 
general  and  guilty  complicity  in  the  crime  of  upholding  and  diffusing 
Human  Slavery.  I  proffer  it  as  my  contribution  toward  a  fuller  and  more 
vivid  realization  of  the  truth  that  God  governs  this  world  by  moral  laws 
as  active,  immutable,  and  all-pervading  as  can  be  operative  in  any  other, 
and  that  every  collusion  or  compromise  with  evil  must  surely  invoke  a 
prompt  and  signal  retribution. 

The  plan  of  this  work  was  broadly  comprehensive.  The 
author  designed  to  "begin  at  the  beginning;"  to  trace  the 
rebellion  tip  to  its  first  causes  and  down  again  to  the  final 
results  of  the  war.  "  I  believe,"  says  he  in  his  first  preface 
which  he  calls  "  preliminary  egotism,"  "  I  believe  the  thought- 
ful reader  of  this  volume  can  hardly  fail  to  see  that  the  great 
struggle  in  which  we  are  engaged  was  the  unavoidable  result 
of  antagonisms  imbedded  in  the  very  nature  of  our  heteroge- 
neous institutions;  —  that  ours  was  indeed  'an  irrepressible 
conflict,'  which  might  have  been  precipitated  or  postponed, 
but  could  by  no  means  have  been  prevented;  —  that  the  suc- 
cessive '  compromises '  whereby  it  was  so  long  put  off,  were, 
however  intended,  deplorable  mistakes,  detrimental  to  our 
national  character;  —  that  we  ought  —  so  early,  at  least,  as 
1819 — to  have  definitively  and  conclusively  established  the  right 
of  the  constitutional  majority  to  shape  our  national  policy 
according  to  their  settled  convictions,  subject  only  to  the  Con- 
stitution as  legally  expounded  and  applied.  Had  the  majority 
then  stood  firm,  they  would  have  precluded  the  waste  of  thou- 
sands of  millions  of  treasure  and  rivers  of  generous  blood." 

We  accordingly  find  that  the  first  of  the  two  volumes  of 
which  the  work  is  composed  relates  mainly  to  civil  affairs, 
while  the  second  is  mainly  military.  The  former  is  a  history 
of  the  political  and  moral  issues  which  agitated  the  American 
people  from  the  time  of  their  independence;  of  such  political 


49*  iJKJL  Or   HORACE   CKEELEY. 

and  moral  issues  as,  in  the  progress  of  their  discussion  became 
paramount;  assumed  the  proportions  of  "an  irrepressible  con- 
flict;" war.  In  a  word,  we  have  in  this  volume  the  history 
of  the  Slavery  Question  in  this  country  from  the  year  of  the 
Declaration  of  Independence  to  the  beginning  of  the  rebellion. 
In  the  second  volume,  we  have  the  history  of  the  conflict  of 
arms,  happily  interwovon  with  which  is  a  history  of  the  pro- 
gress of  those  ideas  in  the  country,  in  the  National  Congress, 
and  in  the  Executive  Department  of  tl.e  government,  which 
culminated  in  Emancipation  and  at  last,  through  Emancipation, 
in  victory. 

Such,  in  briefest  outline,  was  the  general  plan  adopted  by 
Mr.  Greeley.  He  begins  with  saying:  "  No  one  can  realize 
more  vividly  than  I  do,  that  the  History  through  whose  pages 
our  great-grandchildren  will  contemplate  the  momentous 
struggle  whereof  this  country  has  recently  been  and  still  is  the 
arena,  will  not  and  cannot  now  be  written;  and  that  its  author 
must  give  to  the  patient,  careful,  critical  study  ol  innumerable 
documents  and  letters,  an  amount  of  time  and  thought  which 
I  could  not  have  commanded,  unless  I  had  been  able  to  devote 
years,  instead  of  months  only,  to  the  preparation  of  this  vol- 
ume. I  know,  at  least,  what  history  is,  and  how  it  must  be 
made;  I  know  how  very  far  this  work  must  fall  short  of  the 
lofty  ideal.  If  any  of  my  numeroijs  fellow-labourers  in  this 
field  is  deluded  with  the  notion  that  he  has  written  the  history 
of  our  gigantic  civil  war,  /,  certainly,  am  free  from  like  hallu- 
cination." 

If  we  take  this  opinion  to  be  correct  as  regards  the  history 
of  the  conflict  of  arms,  we  may  well  doubt  its  application  to 
a  very  large  share  of  "The  American  Conflict:"  all  those  por- 
tions, namely,  which  relate  accounts  of  the  causes  leading  to 
the  war,  and  which  in  reality  make  a  not  unfaithful  history  of 
the  most  important  political  issue  which  has  been  as  yet  dis- 
cussed by  the  thinkers,  statesmen,  and  people  of  our  republic. 
And  to  this  great  branch  of  his  subject,  Mr.  Greeley  did  give 
many  years  of  labour  and  reflection.  We  say  that  Daniel 
Webster's  great  speech  in  reply  to  Hayne,  of  South  Carolina, 
was  extemporaneous.  He  had  but  the  briefest  possible  notes. 


"THE  AMERICAN   CONFLICT."  495 

and  these  pertaining  to  the  playful  not  the  most  celebrated 
parts  of  the  speech.  The  compact,  unanswerable  argument, 
the  majestic  eloquence,  the  sublime  outbursts  of  patriotism  all 
came  fresh  from  the  glowing  mind  and  soul.  Nevertheless, 
Mr.  Webster  had  studied  that  speech  for  twenty-five  years.  He 
had  given  the  principal  topics  of  which  it  treated  long  and  intense 
reflection,  great  reading.  Thus  in  a  few  hours  he  was  able  to 
utter  arguments,  ideas,  sentiments,  which  his  mind  had  been 
gathering  for  a  quarter  of  a  century.  So  it  was  also  with  those 
portions  of  Mr.  Greeley's  greatest  literary  work  to  which  special 
reference  is  here  had.  They  were  composed  with  remarkable 
rapidity,  which  was  made  possible  by  more  than  thirty  years' 
study  of  the  subjects  under  consideration.  These  long  years 
of  study  placed  the  political  portions  of  the  History  at  his 
pen's  end. 

We  have  seen,  from  Mr.  Greeley's  own  account  of  the  com- 
position of  this  work,  that,  as  to  the  accounts  of  military 
operations,  the  first  edition  contained  many  errors.  To  the 
correction  of  these  he  gave  every  attention,  great  solicitude 
indeed,  making  not  a  few  expensive  changes  in  the  stereotype 
plates.  Thus  the  work  became  scarcely  less  valuable  in  its 
military  than  its  civil  history. 

His  plan  of  narrating  military  events  was  diiferent  from 
that  generally  adopted  in  history.  Instead  of  giving  accounts 
of  simultaneous  movements  or  campaigns,  the  narration  of  one 
constantly  interrupting  that  of  another,  he  followed  a  move- 
ment or  campaign  to  its  close,  before  taking  up  the  history  of 
another.  That  he  thus  made  the  history  of  events  clearer  to 
general  readers,  and,  upon  the  whole,  presented  a  more  complete 
daguerreotype  of  the  war  than  might  have  been  done  upon  the 
plan  usually  followed,  there  can  be  little  doubt. 

These  two  immense  volumes  were  composed  in  about  two 
years,  the  author  not  pretermitting  his  duties  upon  The 
Tribune.  Some  one  has  said  the  difference  between  a  man  of 
genius  and  another  is,  that  the  genius  can  put  many  hundred 
pounds  of  steam  on  the  square  inch,  without  breaking  things, 
and  the  other  cannot.  Horace  Greeley's  capacity  in  this 
respect  seems  to  have  been  almost  unlimited. 


496  LIFE   OF  HORACE  GEEELEY. 

The  dedication  of  "The  American  Conflict"  is  very  beau- 
tiful : 

.    TO 

JOHN  BRIGHT, 

BRITISH  COMMONER  AND  CHRISTIAN  STATESMAN:  THK 

FRIEND  OF  MY  COUNTRY-,  BECAUSE  THE  FRIEND 

OF  MANKIND:    THIS  RECORD  OF  A 

NATION'S  STRUGGLE 

TIP 

FROM  DARKNESS  AND  BONDAGE  TO  LIGHT  AND  LIBERTY, 
18  REGAHDFULLY,  GRATEFULLY  INSCRIBED 

BY 

•  THE  AUTHOR, 

Horace  Greeley  became  a  "  protectionist "  very  early  in  life, 
and  under  circumstances  showing  his  remarkable  independence 
of  judgment.  In  1866,  he  was  elected  President  of  the  Ameri- 
can Institute, —  thirty-five  years  after  he  had  found  his  way 
to  the  hall  of  that  association,  to  attend  a  Tariff  Convention, 
he  being  then  an  unknown  journeyman  printer  seeking 
work.  Upon  taking  the  chair,  as  President  of  the  Institute, 
he  gave  an  account  of  how  he  became  a  "protectionist," 
saying: 

"It  is  now  more  than  thirty-four  years  since  I,  a  minor  and  a  stranger  in 
this  city,  had  my  attention  drawn  to  a  notice  in  the  journals  that  the 
friends  of  protection  to  American  industry  were  to  meet  that  day  in  con- 
vention  at  the  rooms  of  the  American  Institute, —  said  Institute  being  then 
much  younger  than,  though  not  so  obscure  as,  I  was.  I  had  no  work,  and 
could  find  none;  so,  feeling  a  deep  interest  in  and  devotion  to  the  cause 
which  that  convention  was  designed  to  promote,  I  attended  its  sittings; 
and  this  was  my  fkst  introduction  to  the  American  Institute;  which  I 
have  ever  since  esteemed  and  honoured,  though  the  cares  and  labours  of  a 
busy,  anxious  life  have  not  allowed  me  hitherto  to  devote  to  its  meetings 
the  time  that  I  would  gladly  have  given  them. 

"  I  recur  to  the  fact  that  I  was  drawn  to  the  American  Institute  by  my 
interest  in  and  sympathy  with  the  cause  of  protection  to  home  industry. 
From  early  boyhood  I  had  sat  at  the  feet  of  Hezekiah  Nilcs  and  Henry 
Cfiiy  and  Walter  Forward  and  Rollin  C.  Mallory.  and  other  champions  of 
this  doctrine,  and  I  had  attained  from  a  perusal  of  theirs  and  kindred  writ- 
ings and  speeches  a  most  undoubting  conviction  that  the  policy  they 
commended  was  eminently  calculated  to  impel  our  country  swiftly  and 


PROTECTION.  497 

surely  onward  through  activity  and  prosperity  to  greatness  and  assured 
well-being.  I  had  studied  the  question  dispassionately, —  for  the  journals 
accessible  to  my  boyhood  were  mainly  those  of  Boston,  then  almost  if  not 
quite  unanimously  hostile  to  protection,;  but  the  arguments  they  corn- 
batted  seemed  to  me  far  stronger  than  those  they  advanced,  and  I  early 
became  an  earnest  and  ardent  disciple  of  the  school  of  Niles  and  Clay.  I 
could  not  doubt  that  the  policy  they  commended  was  that  best  calculated 
to  lead  a  country  of  vast  and  undeveloped  resources,  like  ours,  up  from 
rude  poverty  and  dependence,  to  skilled  efficiency,  wealth,  and  power. 
And  the  convictions  thus  formed  have  been  matured  and  strengthened 
by  the  observations  and  experience  of  subsequent  years.  Thus  was  I 
attracted  to  the  rooms  and  the  counsels  of  the  American  Institute." 

Of  the  policy  of  "protection,"  The  Tribune  has  been  an 
earnest  and  powerful  advocate  during  the  whole  of  its  history. 
It  is  not  too  much  to  say,  perhaps,  that  it  has  done  more  for 
that  policy  than  all  the  public  men  who  have  advocated  it 
combined.  If  there  was  one  person  entitled  to  be  called  the 
representative  man  of  "protection"  in  our  country,  it  was 
Horace  Gre^ley. 

But  much  as  he  did  for  the  cause  in  The  Tribune  in  pam- 
phlets, and  public  addresses,  he  was  not  content  therewith,  but 
wrote  a  book  also  upon  the  subject.  In  1870,  Messrs.  Fields, 
Osgood,  &  Co.,  of  Boston,  published  a  duodecimo  volume  by 
Mr.  Greeley,  entitled:  "Essays  Designed  to  Elucidate  the  Sci- 
ence of  Political  Economy,  while  Serving  to  Explain  and 
defend  the  policy  of  Protection  to  Home  Industry,  as  a  Sys- 
tem of  National  Cooperation  for  the  Elevation  of  Labour." 
This  work  was  designed  to  be  a  practical  hand-book  for  gen- 
eral readers  rather  than  a  scientific  treatise.  He  expressly 
says  in  the  preface: 

Writing  for  common  people,  I  have  aimed,  above  all  things,  to  be  lucid 
and  simple.  My  illustrations  are  drawn  from  our  National  history,  mainly 
from  that  part  of  it  whereof  there  are  many  living  witnessess;  and  I  have 
preferred  those  to  whose  truthfulness  I  could  personally  bear  testimony. 
If  these  shall  often  seem  to  the  fastidious,  homely  and  commonplace,  I  do 
not  believe  that  they  will,  on  that  account,  be  less  acceptable  to,  or  less 
effective  with,  the  large  number  of  my  readers. 

"  I  write,"  he  says  again,  "  for  the  great  mass  of  intelligent, 
observant,  reflecting  farmers  and  mechanics;  and,  if  I  succeed 

32 


498  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELET. 

in  making  ray  positions  clearly  nnderstood,  I  do  not  fear  that 
they  will  be  condemned  or  rejected." 

The  work  was  not  only  rapidly  but  hastily  written.  For 
this  the  author  apologizes.  "  Had  I  been  able,"  he  states,  "  to 
snatch  more  time  from  the  incessant  labours  and  cares  of  a 
most  exacting  vocation,  I  should  have  presented  a  more  com- 
plete and  unexceptionable  work.  I  ought  to  have  had  at  least 
one  full  year  for  the  preparation  of  this  volume;  whereas,  I 
hf.ve  given  it  but  a  portion  of  my  time  for  six  months." 

I  have  deemed  it  but  simple  justice  not  only  to  Mr.  Greeley 
as  an  author,  but  to  the  cause  of  "  protection "  to  here  state 
these  facts.  They  suffice  to  show  that  the  work  is  rather  a 
heavy  pamphlet  than  a  carefully-meditated  book.  They  also 
account  for  its  somewhat  excessive  controversial  spirit,  and  its 
want  of  philosophical  generalization. 

Those  who  have  high  respect  for  Horace  Greeley's  genius, — 
the  candid  of  those  who  differ  with  him  upon  the  subject  of 
"protection,"  as  well  as  those  who  agree, — -will  regret  that, 
instead  of  this  hastily -prepared  hand-book  for  general  readers, 
he  did  not  undertake  to  compose  a  philosophical  treatise  upon 
the  subject  of  Political  Economy.  For,  no  matter  that  it  be 
unfair  toward  him  and  toward  the  policy  which  he  specially 
espouses  in  this  book  to  compare  it  with  other  works  upon  the 
general  subject,  yet  such  is  the  inevitable  result.  Mr.  Greeley 
comes  to  be  compared,  therefore,  as  an  author,  with  many 
thinkers  and  writers  of  distinguished  fame,  whose  genius,  vast 
research,  wisdom  are  universally  confessed,  and  who  have  given 
very  many  more  years  to  the  composition  of  works  upon  Polit- 
ical Economy  than  he  gave  months  to  the  composition  of  his. 
If  we  take  not  into  consideration  the  difference  of  circn  instan- 
ces, as  here  noted,  such  comparisons  will  be  greatly  unfavour- 
able to  Mr.  Greeley. 

The  work  has  a  remarkable  dedication : 


499 

TO  THE  MEMOBY 
OP 

HENRY    CLAY, 

THE  GENIAL,  GALLANT,   HIGH-SOULED  PATRIOT,    ORATOR,   AND 

STATESMAN;     THE   NOBLEST    EMBODIMENT    OP   AMERICAN 

GENIUS,    CHARACTER,    AND    ASPIRATIONS;     THE    MAN 

WHO      MOST      EFFECTIVELY      COMMENDED      THE 

POLICY     OF     PROTECTION     TO     THE    UlSTDER- 

STANDINGS      AND      HEARTS      OF      THE 

MASSES     OP    HIS    COUNTRYMEN, 

THIS  WORK 

OF  ONE    AMONG    THE    MANY  WHO    STILL  LOVE,   HONOUR,  AND 
ADMIRE   HIM, 

IS  AFFECTIONATELY  DEDICATED 

BY 

THE   AUTHOR. 

But  about  a  year  before  the  appearance  of  Mr.  Greeley's 
"  Political  Economy,"  his  " Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life"  had 
been  published  in  a  volume,  thus  appearing  in  the  latter  part 
of  1868.  The  chapters  of  which  the  work  is  composed  had 
previously  appeared  in  Mr.  Robert  Bonner's  New-York  Ledger 
literary  journal.  Mr.  Bonner  had  meditated,  nearly  ten  years 
before,  the  embalming  of  Mr.  Greeley  among  the  poets,  to 
which  he  decidedly  demurred  in  the  following  letter: 

NEW-YORK,  February,  1859. 

MR.  BONNER  : — I  perceive  by  your  Ledger  that  you  purpose  to  publish 
a  volume  (or  perhaps  several  volumes)  made  up  of  poems  not  contained 
in  Mr.  Dana's  Household  Book  of  Poetry,  and  I  heartily  wish  success  to 
your  enterprise.  There  are  genuine  poems  of  moderate  length  which  can- 
not be  found  in  that  collection,  excellent  as  it  palpably  is,  and  superior 
in  value,  as  I  deem  it,  to  any  predecessor  or  yet  extant  rival.  There  are, 
moreover,  some  genuine  poets  whose  names  do  not  figure  in  Mr.  Dana's 
double  index ;  and  I  thank  you  for  undertaking  to  render  them  justice ; 
only  take  care  not  to  neutralize  or  nullify  your  chivalrous  championship 
by  burying  them  under  a  cartload  of  rhymed  rubbish,  such  as  my  great 
namesake  plausibly  averred  that  neither  gods  nor  men  can  abide,  and  you 
will  have  rendered  literature  a  service  and  done  justice  to  slighted  merit. 

But,  Mr.  Bonner,  be  good  enough  — you  must  —  to  exclude  me  from  your 
new  poetic  Pantheon.  I  have  no  business  therein, —  no  right,  and  no  desire 
to  be  installed  there.  I  am  no  poet,  never  was  (in  expression),  and  never 
shall  be.  True,  I  wrote  some  verses  in  my  callow  days,  as  I  presume  most 


500  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GREELEY. 

persons  who  can  make  intelligible  pen-marks  have  done;  but  I  was  never 
a  poet,  even  in  the  mists  of  deluding  fancy.  All  my  verses,  I  trust,  would 
not  fill  one  of  your  pages ;  they  were  mainly  written  under  the  spur  of 
some  local  or  personal  incitement,  which  long  ago  passed  away.  Though 
in  structure  metrical,  they  were  in  essence  prosaic;  they  wore  read  by  few, 
and  those  fpw  have  kindly  forgotten  them.  Within  the  last  ten  years  I 
have  been  accused  of  all  possible  and  some  impossible  offences  against 
good  taste,  good  morals,  and  the  common  weal, —  I  have  been  branded 
aristocrat,  communist,  infidel,  hypocrite,  demagogue,  disunionist,  traitor, 
corruptionist,  etc.,  etc., —  but. I  cannot  remember  that  any  one  has  flung  in 
my  face  my  youthful  transgressions  in  the  way  of  rhyme.  Do  not,  then, 
accord  to  the  malice  of  my  many  enemies  this  forgotten  means  of  annoy- 
ance. Let  the  dead  rest!  and  let  me  enjoy  the  reputation  which  I  covet 
and  deserve,  of  knowing  poetry  from  prose,  which  the  ruthless  resurrec- 
tion of  my  verses  would  subvert,  since  the  undiscerning  majority  would 
blindly  infer  that  /  considered  them  poetry.  Let  me  up ! 

Thine,  HORACE  GREELEY. 

Mr.  Bonner,  it  seeins,  "  let  him  up  "  for  that  time,  but  deter- 
mined to  put  him  to  his  mettle  in  prose.  The  "  Recollections  " 
came  in  good  time.  1  have  so  frequently  quoted  from  these 
Recollections,  as  they  were  afterwards  collected  and  published 
in  book  form,  that  I  need  say  but  little  of  them  here.  The 
volume  strikes  me  as  being  Mr.  Greeley's  most  pleasing  literary 
work.  It  seems  that  we  find  here  best  reflected  his  noble 
character  and  his  great  genius ;  and  this  as  well  in  what  he 
writes  as  in  what  he  passes  over  in  silence,  modestly  leaving 
much  to  be  said  by  others.  I  know  of  no  autobiography 
which  ought  to  be  in  the  libraries  and  the  minds  of  all  the 
people  so  universally  as  the  "Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life,"  by 
Horace  Greeley. 

When  the  Recollections  were  published  in  a  volume,  Mr. 
Greeley  added  thereto,  under  the  heading  of  "Miscellanies," 
certain  essays  and  articles  which  had  appeared  in  The  Tribune, 
which  he  deemed  might  be  considered  of  permanent  interest. 
The  first  of  these  is  an  essay  upon  "Literature  as  a  Vocation," 
which  concludes  with  this  magnificent  paragraph: 

Let  me  conclude  by  restating  the  main  propositions  which  pervade  and 
vivify  this  essay.  Literature  is  a  noble  calling,  but  only  when  the  call 
obeyed  by  the  aspirant  issues  from  a  world  to  be  enlightened  and  blessed, 
not  from  a  void  stomach  clamouring  to  be  gratified  and  filled.  Authorship 
ia  a  royal  priesthood ;  but  woe  to  him  who  rashly  lays  unhallowed  hands 


LTTEEATUBE.  50 1 

on  the  ark  or  the  altar,  professing  a  zeal  for  the  welfare  of  the  Race  only 
that  he  may  secure  the  confidence  and  sympathies  of  others,  and  use  them 
for  his  own  selfish  ends!  If  a  man  have  no  heroism  in  his  soul,— no 
animating  purpose  beyond  living  easily  and  faring  sumptuously, — I  can 
imagine  no  greater  mistake  on  his  part  than  that  of  resorting  to  authorship 
as  a  vocation.  That  such  a  one  may  achieve  what  he  regards  as  success,  I 
do  not  deny ;  but,  if  so,  he  does  it  at  greater  risk  and  by  greater  exertion 
than  would  have  been  required  to  win  it  in  any  other  pursuit.  No :  it 
cannot  be  wise  in  a  selfish,  or  sordid,  or  sensual  man  to  devote  himself  to 
Literature ;  the  fearful  self-exposure  incident  to  this  way  of  life, — the  dire 
necessity  which  constrains  the  author  to  stamp  his  own  essential  portrait 
on  every  volume  of  his  works,  no  matter  how  carefully  he  may  fancy 
he  has  erased,  or  how  artfully  he  may  suppose  he  has  concealed  it, — this 
should  repel  from  the  vestibule  of  the  temple  of  Fame  the  foot  of  every 
profane  or  mocking  worshiper.  But  if  you  are  sure  that  your  impulse  is 
not  personal  nor  sinister,  but  a  desire  to  serve  and  ennoble  your  Race, 
rather  than  to  dazzle  and  be  served  by  it;  that  you  are  ready  joyfully  to 
"  shun  delights,  and  live  laborious  days,"  so  that  thereby  the  well-being 
of  mankind  may  be  promoted, — then  I  pray  you  not  to  believe  that  the 
world  is  too  wise  to  need  further  enlightenment,  nor  that  it  would  be 
impossible  for  one  so  humble  as  yourself  to  §ay  aught  whereby  error  may 
be  dispelled  or  good  be  diffused.  Sell  not  your  integrity ;  barter  not  your 
independence;  beg  of  no  man  the  privilege  of  earning  a  livelihood  by 
Authorship;  since  that  is  to  degrade  your  faculty,  and  very  probably  to 
corrupt  it;  but  seeing  through  your  own  clear  eyes,  and  uttering  the 
impulses  of  your  own.  honest  heart,  speak  or  write  as  truth  and  love  shall 
dictate,  asking  no  material  recompense,  but  living  by  the  labour  of  your 
hands,  until  recompense  shall  be  voluntarily  tendered  to  secure  your 
service,  and  you  may  frankly  accept  it  without  a  compromise  of  your 
integrity  or  a  peril  to  your  freedom.  Soldier  in  the  long  warfare  for  Man's 
rescue  from  Darkness  and  Evil,  choose  not  your  place  on  the  battle-field, 
but  joyfully  accept  that  assigned  you ;  asking  not  whether  there  be 
higher  or  lower,  but  only  whether  it  is  here  that  you  can  most  surely 
do  your  proper  work,  and  meet  your  full  share  of  the  responsibility  and 
the  danger.  Believe  not  that  the  Heroic  Age  is  no  more ;  since  to  that 
age  is  only  requisite  the  heroic  purpose  and  the  heroic  soul.  So  long  as 
ignorance  and  evil  shall  exist,  so  long  there  will  be  work  for  the  devoted, 
and  so  long  will  there  be  room  in  the  ranks  of  those  who,  defying  obloquy, 
misapprehension,  bigotry,  and  interested  craft,  struggle  and  dare  for  the 
redemption  of  the  world.  "  Of  making  manjr  books  there  is  no  end," 
though  there  is  happily  a  speedy  end  of  most  books  after  they  are  made ; 
but  he  who  by  voice  or  pen  strikes  his  best  blow  at  the  impostures  and 
vices  whereby  our  race  is  debased  and  paralyzed  may  close  his  eyes  in 
death,  consoled  and  cheered  by  the  reflection  that  he  has  done  what  he 
could  for  the  emancipation  and  elevation  of  his  kind. 


502  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

Among  these  ^Miscellanies"  is  a  republication  of  the  noted 
discussion  between  Mr.  Greeley  and  Robert  Dale  Owen,  on  the 
subject  of  "  Marriage  and  Divorce,"  the  Editor  of  The  Tribune 
taking  high  ground  in  favour  of  the  indissolubility  of  mar- 
riage, except  for  a  single  cause,  his  distinguished  disputant 
contending  for  the  wisdom,  policy,  and  morality  of  the  liberal 
statute  of  the  State  of  Indiana  upon  this  subject.  Mr.  Greeley 
found  in  Mr.  Owen  a  keener  and  a  broader  mind  than  he  had 
often  coped  with;  and  it  would  be  difficult  to  decide  whether 
the  one  or  the  other  won  the  victory.  Let  it  suffice  here  to 
Bay  that  Mr.  Greeley's  articles  in  the  dispute  were  character- 
ized not  only  by  his  usual  intellectual  strength  and  force  of 
reasoning,  but  by  a  moral  elevation  of  tone  and  religious 
fervour  in  the  highest  degree  admirable. 

The  last  volume  from  the  pen  of  Horace  Greeley  was,  "  What 
I  Know  of  Fanning,"  the  preface  of  which  was  written  Febru- 
ary 3,  1871,  the  day  on  which  he  completed  the  sixtieth  year 
of  his  life.  Mr.  Greeley  was  exceedingly  happy  in  dedications, 
but  he  surpassed  himself  in  the  inimitable  propriety  and 
drollery  of  his  dedication  of  this  work: 

TO 
THE  MAN  OF  OUR  AGE, 

WHO  SHALL  MAKE  THE  FIRST  PLOW   PROPELLED  BY 

STEAM, 
OB  OTHER  MECHANICAL  POWER,  WHEREBY  NOT  LESS  THAN 

TEN  ACRES  PER  DAY 

BHAL  BE  THOROUGHLY  PULVERIZED  TO  A 

DEPTH  OF  TWO  FEET, 

AT  A  COST   OF  NOT   MORE  THAN   TWO   DOLLARS  PER  ACRE, 
THIS  WORK  IS  ADMIRINGLY  DEDICATED  BY 

THE  AUTHOR 

The  object  of  the  work  was  to  elevate  the  farmer's  calling; 
to  make  it  much  more  of  a  desirable  and  elevating  pursuit 
than  it  was  too  often  made  by  those  engaged  in  it.  In  the 
preface  to  the  work  he  says: 

We  need  to  mingle  more  thought  with  our  work.  Some  think  till  their 
heads  ache  intensely;  others  work  till  their  backs  are  crooked  to  the 


LABOUR   REFOKM.  503 

semblance  of  half  an  iron  hoop ;  but  the  workers  and  the  thinkers  are 
&pt  to  be  distinct  classes ;  whereas  they  should  be  the  same.  Admit  that 
it  has  always  been  thus,  it  by  no  means  follows  that  it  always  should  or 
shall  be.  In  an  age  when  every  labourer's  son  may  be  fairly  educated  if 
he  will,  there  should  be  more  fruit  gathered  from  the  tree  of  knowledge 
to  justify  the  magnificent  promise  of  its  foliage  and  its  bloom.  I  rejoice 
in  the  belief  that  the  graduates  of  our  common  schools  are  better  ditch- 
diggers  when  they  can  no  otherwise  employ  themselves  to  better  advantage, 
than  though  they  knew  not  how  to  read;  but  that  is  not  enough.  If  the 
untaught  peasantry  of  Russia  or  Hungary  grow  more  wheat  per  acre  than 
the;  comparatively  educated  farmers  of  the  United  States,  our  education  is 
found  wanting.  That  is  a  vicious  and  defective  if  not  radically  false 
mental  training  which  leaves  its  subject  no  better  qualified  for  any  useful 
calling  than  though  he  were  unlettered.  But  I  forbear  to  pursue  this 
ever-fruitful  theme. 

I  look  back,  on  thia  day  completing  my  sixtieth  year,  over  a  life,  which 
must  now  be  near  its  close,  of  constant  effort  to  achieve  ends  whereof  many 
seem  in  the  long  retrospect  to  have  been  transitory  and  unimportant,  however 
they  may  have  loomed  upon  my  vision  when  in  their  immediate  presence. 
One  achievement  only  of  our  age  and  country — the  banishment  of  human 
chattelhood  from  our  soil — seems  now  to  have  been  worth  all  the  requisite 
efforts,  the  agony  and  bloody  sweat,  through  which  it  was  accomplished. 
But  another  reform,  not  so  palpably  demanded  by  justice  and  humanity, 
yet  equally  conducive  to  the  well-being  of  our  race,  presses  hard  on  its 
heels,  and  insists  that  we  shall  accord  it  instant  and  earnest  consideration. 
It  is  the  elevation  of  Labour  from  the  plane  of  drudgery  and  servility  to 
one  of  self-respect,  self-guidance,  and  genuine  independence,  so  as  to 
render  the  human  worker  no  mere  cog  in  a  vast,  revolving  wheel,  whose 
motion  he  can  neither  modify  nor  arrest,  but  a  partner  in  the  enterprise 
which  his  toil  is  freely  contributed  to  promote,  a  sharer  in  the  outlay,  the 
risk,  the  loss  and  gain,  which  it  involves.  This  end  can  be  attained 
through  the  training  of  the  generation  who  are  to  succeed  us  to  observe 
and  reflect,  to  live  for  other  and  higher  ends  than  those  of  present  sensual 
gratification,  and  to  feel  that  no  achievement  is  beyond  the  reach  of  their 
wisely  combined  and  ably  self-directed  efforts.  To  that  part  of  the 
generation  of  farmers  just  coming  upon  the  stage  of  responsible  action, 
who  have  intelligently  resolved  that  the  future  of  American  agriculture 
shall  evince  decided  and  continuous  improvement  on  its  past,  this  little 
book  is  respectfully  commended. 

I  have  quoted  this  passage  not  only  to  show  -the  general 
object  Mr.  Greeley  had  in  view  in  writing  the  book,  but 
also  to  exhibit  the  fact  that  he  had  lost  no  jot  or  tittle  of  his 
respect  for  Labour;  that  as  he  had  commenced  his  public  career 
with  efforts  in  behalf  of  its  elevation  so  he  approached  the 
close  of  his  life  manfully  battling  in  the  same  good  cause.  1 


504:  LIFE  OF   HORACE  OKEELEY. 

also  desire  to  call  special  attention  to  the  fact  that  Horace 
Greeley  here  expressed  the  opinion  that  Labour  Reform  is  no 
less  conducive  to  the  welfare  of  our  race  than  was  the  abolition 
of  human  slavery,  arid  demands  that  we  shall  accord  it  instant 
and  earnest  consideration.  Herein,  it  will  not  long  hence  be 
seen,  I  trust,  he  manifested  both  wisdom  and  prophecy. 
Already  may  we  dimly  perceive  the  approaching  contest 
between  corruption  and  honest  government;  between  the 
usurped  power  of  Corporationism  and  the  just  rights  of  the 
labouring  masses.  There  is  here  that  radical  antagonism 
between  systems  which  are  right  and  claims  which  are  wrong, 
upon  the  settlement  of  which  the  happiness  or  misery  of 
millions  depends,  in  which  are  the  elements  of  "  an  irrepres- 
sible conflict."  And  it  is  through  irrepressible  conflicts,  and 
through  them  alone,  that  the  human  race  has  thus  far  in  its 
history  made  any  progress  toward  perfect  justice,  general  hap- 
piness, and  universal  brotherhood.  If  Mr.  Greeley  was  right,-— 
as  I  am  confident  he  was,  —  that  in  Labour  Reform  lay  the 
most  momentous  issue  of  the  time,  let  us  bravely  welcome  the 
conflict,  and  pray  Heaven  to  speed  it!  We  need  have  no  fear 
of  the  final  result.  Heaven  has  never  yet  been  known  to  take 
the  side  of  a  close  corporation  in  a  fair  fight  with  The  People. 
But  Heaven  expects  every  man  to  do  his  duty,  and  allow  no 
cheating. 

Mr.  Greeley  succeeded  in  making  "  What  I  know  of  Farm- 
ing" a  work  of  great  practical  value  to  farmers,  and  such  as 
excited  among  many  of  them  an  earnest  desire  to  elevate  and 
dignify  agriculture.  The  judgment  of  one  successful  farmer 
upon  a  work  of  this  character  is  worth  a  volume  of  bookish 
criticism.  I  have  heard  many  say  they  have  read  it  with 
interest  and  profit.  Among  others,  Mr.  William  J.  Lewis,  one 
of  the  most  extensive  and  wealthy  farmers  of  Connecticut, 
informed  me  that  he  purchased  the  work  more  out  of  curiosity 
than  otherwise,  but  "  I  have  to  say,"  he  continued,  "  that  it 
gave  me  more  valuable  practical  information,  —  information  of 
use  to  me  on  my  farm,  —  than  I  ever  got  from  all  the  other 
books  on  agriculture  I  ever  read."  I  quote  from  memory,  but 
this  is  the  substance  of  Mr.  Lewis's  remark.  I  recollect  that 


MR.    GREELEY   AS   AN   AUTHOR  505 

lie  made  special  mention  of  the  valuable  lessons  he  had  learned 
from  Mr.  Greeley  upon  the  subject  of  fencing. 

From  the  foregoing  account  of  the  works  written  by  Horace 
Greeley  it  is  believed  general  readers  may  make  a  not  inaccu- 
rate estimate  of  him  as  an  author.  It  is  to  be  considered  that 
the  profession  of  journalism  is  so  exacting,  and  so  constant  in  its 
exactions,  that  it  is  not  conducive  to  the  literary  habit.  It 
does  not,  except  in  extraordinary  minds,  tend  to  intellectual 
growth.  And  this  because  it  does  not  leave  leisure  for  calm 
reflection.  Wisdom  comes  not  of  much  knowledge  but  of 
much  thinking.  Sufficient  unto  the  day  is  the  evil  thereof, 
saith  the  Scripture.  Sufficient  unto  the  day  is  the  labour 
thereof,  says  the  journalist.  He  is  apt  to  remain  about  the 
same  yesterday,  to-day,  and  forever.  The  time  will  come,  — 
I  trust  soon,  —  when  journalists  will  not  be  so  overworked  as 
has  been  too  generally  the  case  since  the  great  development  of 
the  modern  public  press.  Up  to  this  time,  the  demand  for 
capable  journalists  has  been  greater  than  the  supply.  I  mean 
here  precisely  what  I  say;  neither  less  nor  more.  The  conse- 
quence is,  of  course,  that  capable  journalists  are  required  to 
write  so  much  that  they  have  little  time  for  anything  else; 
seldom  enough  for  literary  labour  requiring  persistent  study 
and  profound  meditation.  That  our  journalism  does  not  suffer 
herefrom  is  evident  from  its  recognized  excellence.  But  what 
our  journalism  has  gained,  literature  has,  in  a  degree  at  least, 
lost. 

That  Mr.  Greeley  founded  a  great  and  enduring  journal,  ever 
directing  its  management,  ever  performing  more  labour  for  it 
than  any  other  person,  and  also  succeeded  as  an  author,  is  proof 
of  most  remarkable  capacity  of  intellectual  labour.  His  "  Amer- 
ican Conflict"  will  be,  I  think,  an  enduring  monument  to  his 
fame.  If  there  are  passages  in  it  of  a  too  controversial  nature 
—  rather  in  the  editorial  than  in  the  historical  style  —  there  are 
very  many  others  of  surpassing  beauty  and  power;  while  the 
whole  is  an  attestation  of  conscientious  research,  impartiality, 
and  genius.  His  " Recollections  of  a  Busy  Life"  is  one  of 
the  best  of  autobiographies;  crowded  full  of  clear,  beautiful 


506 


LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 


passages,  with  some  of  almost  heavenly  tenderness  and  many 
of  sublime  magnanimity.  I  confess  that  I  have  a  great  par- 
tiality for  "  What  I  know  of  Farming."  It  is  a  home  book 
for  home  people  on  their  farms.  It  is  full  of  homely  wisdom. 
It  is  one  of  the  people  speaking  to  the  people,  as  one  of  them 
never  before  spake.  It  is  not  impossible  that  it  may  have  a 
longer  life  than  many  volumes  far  more  pretentious. 

Whilst,  therefore,  we  may  justly  place  a  high  estimate  upon 
Mr.  Greeley  as  an  author,  he  will  not  occupy  the  preeminen 
position  in  the  literature  of  his  country  that  he  attained  in 
journalism.     To  authorship  he  gave  a  divided  affection;  his 
whole  heart  to  The  New- York  Tribune. 


MANTON   MARBLE.— See  page  517. 


CHAPTEE   XXVII: 

1868  TO  1872. 

The  Presidential  Campaign  of  1868  —  Nomination  of  General  Grant  by 
the  Republicans  and  of  Horatio  Seymour  by  the  Democrats  —  Mr. 
Greeley  Supports  General  Grant — The  Canvass  —  Success  of  the  Re- 
publicans—  President  Grant's  First  Cabinet — He  Secures  the  "Wrath 
of  Professional  Politicians  —  Mr.  Greeley  at  First  Sustains  the  Admin- 
istration —  A  Candidate  for  Congress  Against  S.  S.  Cox  —  The 
"Revenue  Reform"  Movement  —  The  Formation  of  a  New  Party 
Undertaken  —  The  Ideas  of  Its  Representative  Men  —  Mr.  Greeley  Not 
at  First  in  the  Movement. 

LET  us  now  recur  again  to  the  life  of  Mr.  Greeley  as  con- 
nected with  public  affairs.  The  political  questioti  which  most 
elicited  discussion  from  the  time  of  the  close  of  the  war  up  to 
the  political  campaign  of  1868  was  that  of  the  Reconstruction 
of  the  South.  There  were  other  topics  which  at  times  largely 
engaged  the  public  attention, — as,  for  example,  the  remarkable 
contest  between  Congress  and  President  Johnson, — but  they 
were  connected  with  this  absorbing  issue,  and,  generally,  grew 
out  of  it.  It  may  be  stated  that  Mr.  Greeley's  policy  of  recon- 
struction was  more  comprehensive  in  its  philanthropy  than 
that  of  most  of  his  long  political  co-labourers  of  the  .North. 
He  not  only  demanded  the  strongest  guarantees  for  the  com- 
plete emancipation  of  the  blacks,'  but  the  removal  of  all 
disabilities  whatever,  by  which  the  whites  of  the  South  who 
had  participated  in  the  rebellion  were  affected.  Horace  Gree- 
ley's policy  contemplated  that  the  republic  should  be  wholly 
emancipated  from  all  the  ill  effects  of  slavery  and  of  the  war. 
Upon  no  other  basis,  he  thought,  could  there  be  a  just,  free, 
and  enduring  Union.  "  Universal  amnesty;  impartial  suf- 
frage,"— such  was  his  terse  expression  constantly  used  in  The 
Tribune. 

It  is  worthy  of  remark  that  though  Mr.  Greeley  was  by  many 

(507) 


508  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

in  the  Republican  party  criticised,  in  respect  of  what  they 
regarded  as  his  too  generous  policy  of  reconstruction,  yet  did 
the  party  at  length  adopt  his  views,  both  by  national  platform 
and  congressional  legislation.  It  is  also  noteworthy  that  where 
this  policy  was  adopted  in  Southern  States,  its  practical  opera- 
tions were  found  to  result  in  the  prosperity  and  progress  of 
those  commonwealths;  in  the  great  and  valuable  victories  of 
peace. 

The  political  campaign  of  1868  was  one  of  issues  which 
rather  looked  back  upon  the  past  than  forward  to  the  future, 
or  even  round  about  upon  the  present.  Though  the  war  had 
been  terminated  three  years  before  in  the  complete  triumph  of 
the  Union  cause,  the  political  operations  of  the  Presidential 
canvass  were  chiefly  devoted  to  war.  Many  an  orator 

"  Wept  o'er  his  wounds,  or,  tales  of  sorrow  done, 
Shouldered  his  crutch  and  showed  how  fields  were  won." 

Many  another  stump  hack  made  "  that  same  old  speech" 
which,  during  the  exciting  time  of  war,  had  aroused  the  patriot- 
ism  of  innumerable  country  school-houses.  If  the  forensic 
efforts,  quite  generally,  of  the  Republican  orators  of  1S68  could 
be  faithfully  daguerreotyped  for  future  generations,  future  gen- 
erations would  infer  that  the  republic,  in  1868,  was  in  the 
midst  of  a  desperate  conflict  of  arms. 

Nor  was  this  singular  canvass,  in  thus  recurring  chiefly  to 
the  past,  altogether  unreasonable.  It  was  but  right  that  the 
recent  triumph  of  arms  should  be  allowed  to  have  all  its 
legitimate  advantages,  in  politics  as  in  other  respects.  Tho 
extreme  length  to  which  this  claim  was  pressed  in  many 
instances,  however,  would  simply  have  changed  the  form  of 
Southern  slavery,  not  have  removed  the  curse.  We  should 
have  had  the  practical  enslavement  of  the  whites  instead  of 
the  blacks.  Against  such  mistaken  and  narrow  policy  Horace 
Greeley  waged  constant  and  earnest  opposition,  as  well  before 
as  after  the  inauguration  of  the  campaign  resulting  in  General 
Grant's  election. 

The  National  Convention  of  the  Republicans  for  the  year 
was  held  at  the  city  of  Chicago.  The  proceedings  were  not 


CANVASS   OF    1868.  SOU 

characterized  by  specially  notable  enthusiasm.  The  most  note- 
worthy event  of  the  occasion,  .perhaps,  was  a  speech  by  the 
Hon.  John  M.  Palmer,  candidate  for  Governor  of  the  State  of 
Illinois,  in  which  he  took  high  ground  in  favour  of  the  pay- 
ment of  the  national  debt,  and  by  cogent  reasoning  advocated 
the  reduction  of  the  burden  of  annual  taxation.  Mr.  Palmer's 
views  were  incorporated  into  the  platform. 

There  was  no  candidate  for  the  Presidency  named,  except 
General  Grant,  who,  on  motion  of  General  John  A.  Logan,  of 
Illinois,  was  unanimously  nominated.  Messrs.  Schuyler  Col- 
fax,  of  Indiana,  Reuben  E.  Fen  ton,  of  New  York,  Henry 
Wilson,  of  Massachusetts,  B.  F.  Wade,  of  Ohio,  and  Andrew 
G.  Curtin,  of  Pennsylvania,  were  the  principal  candidates  for 
Vice-President.  Mr.  Colfax  was  nominated  on  the  third  bal- 
lot,— a  fact  which  was  largely  due  to  the  constant  and  efficient 
labours  in  that  behalf  of  Mr.  John  D.  Defrees  of  Indiana, 
powerfully  seconded  by  the  no  less  earnest  work  of  ex-Senator 
Henry  S.  Lane.  The  Democratic  Convention  was  held  sub- 
sequently in  the  city  of  New- York.  After  an  animated  contest, 
Horatio  Seymour,  of  New  York,  received  the  nomination  as 
candidate  for  President,  General  Francis  P.  Blair,  of  Missouri, 
that  as  Vice-President. 

The  singularity  of  this  canvass  was,  as  has  been  said,  that  it 
was  conducted,  on  the  part  of  the  Republicans,  on  the  heroic 
plan, — as  though  the  nation  were  still  at  war, — and  by  the 
Democrats  on  questions  of  finance  which,  as  presented,  the 
people  were  not  able  to  understand.  In  fact,  the  New- York 
convention  made  two  mistakes;  committed  two  sins  of  omis- 
sion, either  of  which  was  fatal  to  success.  One  of  these  was 
the  defeat  of  Chief  Justice  Chase  for  the  Presidential  nomina- 
tion; the  other,  the  adoption  of  a  platform  failing  unreservedly 
to  recognize  the  utter  defeat  of  Secession  and  to  demand  for 
the  restored  Union  all  the  advantages  justly  belonging  to  its 
triumph.  These  omissions  demonstrated  that  there  was  no 
new  departure  by  the  Democratic  party,  and  left  that  organiza- 
tion to  fight  it  out  on  the  wrong  side,  upon  grave  questions 
growing  out  of  the  recent  war,  which  the  people  believed 
formed  the  paramount  issues  of  the  times.  It  was  impossible 


510  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

to  make  them  think  that  the  dying  embers  of  Secession  wculd 
be  more  quickly  and  completely  quenched  by  ex-Governor 
Seymour  than  by  General  Grant. 

There  were  many  able  and  earnest  men  in  the  Republican 
party  who  would  have  supported  Mr.  Chase  as  against  General 
Grant,  in  any  event;  more  who  would  have  done  so  had  the 
New- York  platform  also  been  such  as,  its  doctrines  enforced, 
•would  have  produced  thorough  pacification  through  justice, 
financial  integrity,  and  freedom  for  all. 

Mr.  Greeley  supported  General  Grant.  The  Tribune  did 
not  cease  to  advocate  some  of  his  views  which  had  been  over- 
ruled by  the  Republican  Convention.  For  example,  he  believed 
in  high  taxation,  especially  by  tariffs,  and  a  speedy  payment  of 
the  national  debt,  whereas  the  Convent  it  >i:  had  adopted  the 
policy  of  an  immediate  reduction  of  taxation  and  payment  of 
the  public  debt  in  subsequent  years,  as  the  nation  might  become 
better  able  to  pay  it.  Though  differing  with  the  Republican 
party  upon  this  and  some  other  questions,  Mr.  Greeley  sup- 
ported General  Grant  with  all  the  influence  of  The  Tribune. 
"  Let  us  have  peace,"  a  happy  expression  used  by  the  Repub- 
lican nominee  in  his  letter  accepting  the  nomination  was  The 
Tribune's  motto  during  the  campaign. 

There  could  have  been  no  doubt  of  the  success  of  the 
Republicans  from  the  time  of  the  New- York  Convention,  with 
whose  action  many  influential  Democrats  were  greatly  dis- 
pleased. Mr.  Seymour  made  a  few  public  addresses  during  the 
campaign,  which  were  fair  manifestations  of  ability  and  states- 
manship, but  nothing  could  have  redeemed  his  mistake  of 
accepting  the  nomination.  The  Republicans  were  greatly 
successful  in  the  elections,  General  Grant  having  a  large 
majority  of  both  popular  and  electoral  votes. 

President  Grant  entered  upon  the  duties  of  his  first  political 
oflice  with  brilliant  demonstration  of  inexperience.  The 
Cabinet  appointed  by  him  was:  Elihu  B.  Washburne,  of 
Illinois,  Secretary  of  State;  A.  T.  Stewart,  of  New- York,  Secre- 
tary of  the  Treasury,  A.  E.  Borie,  of  Pennsylvania,  Secretary 
of  the  Navy;  J.  D.  Cox,  of  Ohio,  Secretary  of  the  Interior; 
John  A.  J.  Creswell,  of  Maryland,  Postmaster  General;  E.  R. 


PRESIDENT  GRANT'S  FIRST  CABINET.  511 

-Hoar,  of  Massachusetts,  Attorney  General.  General  Slierman 
for  a  time  performed  the  duties  of  Secretary  of  War.  It  was 
at  once  discovered  that  Mr.  Stewart,  being  a  merchant,  was 
prevented  by  law  from  serving  as  Secretary  of  the  Treasury. 
Congress  declining  to  repeal  the  law,  Mr.  George  S.  Boutwell, 
of  Massachusetts,  was  appointed  in  his  place. 

Mr.  Borie  was  a  preposterous  Secretary  of  the  Navy;  and 
Judge  Hoar,  though  an  excellent  man  and  able  lawyer,  was  not 
possessed,  in  manner,  of  ways  that  are  winning,  or  impressive. 
Mr.  Washburne,  a  gentleman  of  large  political  experience, 
whose  long  career  as  a  Representative  in  Congress  had  been 
constantly  and  signally  useful,  remained  at  the  head  of  the 
State  Department  only  a  short  time.  Mr.  Hamilton  Fish,  of 
New  York,  succeeded,  Mr.  Washburne  being  appointed  Minister 
to  France.  General  John  A.  Rawlins,  of  Illinois,  was  then 
appointed  Secretary  of  War  —  a  position  which  he  filled,  with 
the  finest  success,  until  relieved  by  death.  He  had  been  at 
the  head  of  General  Grant's  staff  during  the  war,  and  had 
performed  the  difficult,  laborious,  and  responsible  duties  of  the 
office  to  the  great  benefit  both  of  his  chief  and  of  his  country, 
He  wai  an  admirable  Secretary  of  War:  genial  in  manners, 
familiar  with  all  the  affairs  of  the  army  and  the  details  of  the 
department,  prompt  in  decision,  incorruptibly  honest. 

In  the  distribution  of  the  patronage  of  the  executive  office, 
President  Grant  speedily  secured  the  wrath  of  professional  politi- 
cians quite  generally.  In  many  instances  he  wholly  disregarded 
the  recommendations  of  Senators  and  Eepresentatives  in  Con- 
gress, appointing  men  to  office  whom  he  personally  knew  or 
whose  fitness  was  vouched  for  by  friends,  especially  army  friends. 
He  had  not  been  in  the  Executive  Mansion  a  month  until  he 
was  in  what  appeared  to  be  serious  collision  with  his  party. 
He  was  ridiculed  in  private  by  the  politicians  without  mercy. 
There  are  many  men  in  office  in  1873,  who  noisily  if  not  earn- 
estly supported  President  Grant  in  1872,  who  pronounced  him 
an  absurd  President  in  1869. 

It  is  cei  tain  that  in  appointments  he  made  some  ridiculous 
blunders,  and  some  that  were  worse  than  ridiculous.  Never- 
theless, he  was  very  heartily  sustained  by  the  public  at  large 


612  UFE   OF   HORACE   GKEELEY. 

who  thought  that  the  rule  of  the  politicians  was  being  brought 
to  a  needed  termination.  tlad  President  Grant  continued  to 
act  independently  of  the  politicians,  it  is  likely  his  adminis- 
tration would  have  been  more  successful,  very  much  more 
useful.  If  he  had  corrected  his  own  mistakes  instead  of  per- 
mitting himself  to  be  revised  by  others,  it  would  have  been 
better  for  himself  in  history  and  for  the  country  far  more 
beneficial  then  and  afterwards. 

Horace  Greeley,  though  independently  criticising  the  Presi 
dent  in  some  particulars,  sustained  the  administration  upon  the 
whole.  He  gave  especial  commendation  to  the  policy  by  which 
the  public  debt  was  constantly  reduced",  and,  generally,  agreed 
that  there  was  no  cause  of  rupture  between  the  President  and 
the  party  which  had  elected  him,  —  an  opinion  which  was 
less  generally  endorsed  by  representative  men  of  the  party 
than  is  commonly  supposed. 

Mr.  Borie  may  almost  be  said  to  have  been  laughed  out  of 
the  Cabinet.  He  was  succeeded  by  Mr.  George  H.  Robeson, 
of  New  Jersey.  Upon  the  death  of  Secretary  Rawlins,  General 
William  W.  Belknap,  of  Iowa,  was  placed  in  charge  of  the  War 
Department.  Upon  the  retirement  of  Mr.  Cox,  Mr.  Colhmbus 
Delano,  of  Ohio,  became  Secretary  of  the  Interior.  Mr.  Amos 
T.  Akerman,  of  Georgia,  succeeded  Judge  Hoar  as  Attorney 
General  and  was  in  turn  succeeded  by  Mr.  George  H.  Williams, 
of  Oregon.  With  the  Cabinet  thus  reconstructed,  the  President 

o 

conducted  the  administration  of  his  first  term  to  a  close. 

Meantime,  the  Republicans  of  New- York,  being  in  a  minor- 
ity of  voters,  had  some  trouble  to  procure  candidates  for  the 
State  ticket  in  1869.  Mr.  Greeley,  after  two  or  three  persons 
had  declined,  accepted  the  nomination  for  State  Controller. 
He  was  defeated,  as  were  his  associates  on  the  ticket,  but  he 
ran  ahead  of  all,  with  the  exception  of  General  Franz  Sigel, 
who  received  a  great  many  German  votes.  The  fact  is  only 
noteworthy  as  showing  that  Mr.  Greeley  was  more  popular 
than  his  party.  A  similar  fact  was  demonstrated  in  the  fol- 
lowing year,  when  Mr.  Greeley  was  a  candidate  for  Congress 
in  the  sixth  district.  His  competitor  in  this  canvass  was  the 
distinguished  S.  S.  Cox,  noted  both  as  writer  and  politician. 


8.    8.    COX.  513 

He  lifid  long  represented  the  Capital  district  of  Ohio,  in  Con- 
gress, but  having  been  beaten  during  the  war  by  the  lion. 
Samuel  Shellabarger,  removed  to  the  city  of  New- York.  Mr. 
Cox  is  a  man  of  genius.  A  sagacious  politician,  he  is  popular 
without  seeking  popularity,  because  he  deserves  to  be.  On 
account  of  character,  ability,  a  long  and  brilliant  public  record 
showing  few  mistakes,  judged  from  a  partisan  standpoint,  it 
would  have  been  difficult  for  the  Democratic  party  to  select  a 
|  stronger  candidate  to  run  against  Mr.  Greeley;  one  who  would 
have  received  more  votes.  Nevertheless,  the  Democratic 
majority  of  1868  was  reduced  from  nearly  three  thousand  to 
about  one  thousand.  Mr.  Greeley  received  several  hundred 
more  votes  than  the  Republican  candidate  for  Governor,  Gen- 
eral Woodford,  a  man  of  great  popularity.  The  result  was  a 
demonstration  of  the  high  esteem  in  which  Mr.  Greeley  was 
held ;  for  on  account  of  illness  he  was  unable  to  make  a  single 
speech  in  the  district.  He  was  again  shown  to  be  stronger 
than  his  party. 

The  war  having  been  over  some  four  years  when  President 
Grant  was  inaugurated,  and  genuine  republicanism  having  also 
meantime  been  incorporated  into  the  fundamental  law,  there 
were  many  who  thought  that  much  of  the  legislation  of  the 
war  period  demanded  reform.  The  necessary  expenses  of  the 
government,  in  providing  the  sinews  of  war,  had  been  immense. 
The  government  had  also  been  robbed  of  vast  sums  in  the 
aggregate  by  the  summer  soldiers  and  the  sunshine  patriots 
who  infest  every  land  in  times  of  great  commotion.  By  reason 
of  necessary  and  unavoidable  expenditures,  therefore,  enor- 
mous taxation  of  the  people  was  the  price  of  national  salvation. 
"  What  we  obtain  too  cheap,"  said  a  great  writer  of  our  revo- 
lutiary  era,  "we  esteem  too  lightly;  'tis  dearness  only  that 
gives  everything  its  value.  Heaven  knows  how  to  put  a  proper 
price  upon  its  goods;  and  it  would  be  strange  indeed  if  so 
celestial  an  article  as  FREEDOM  should  not  be  highly  rated." 
The  price  paid  for  the  maintenance  of  the  American  Union, 
with  freedom  for  all  its  inhabitants,  was  very  high.  Nor  was 
it  paid  grudgingly  nor  unwillingly.  There  are  few  facts  in  his- 
tory more  creditable  to  any  nationality  than  the  sacrifices 
33 


514  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GKEELEY. 

•which  the  American  people  made  that  free  institutions  might 
be  here  vindicated.  What  the  citizen-soldiery  endured,  as  well 
as  what  they  accomplished,  is  in  no  danger  of  being  forgotten. 
What  the  citizens  who  did  not  become  soldiers  cheerfully  con- 
tributed to  the  support  of  the  imperilled  government  gave 
evidence  of  scarcely  less  heroic  treatment  of  the  rebellion. 

The  war  concluded,  the  army  of  Volunteers  disbanded,  many 
men  began  to  think  that  this  heroic  treatment  in  respect  of 
taxation  should  be  at  once  abandoned.  There  was,  conse- 
quently, something  of  a  concerted  movement  in  the  interest 
of  revenue  reform.  The  war  had  called  into  existence  a  bureau 
of  internal  revenue,  an  establishment  till  then  unknown,  the 
expenditures  of  the  government  having  been  defrayed  by 
duties  upon  imported  goods.  This  new  bureau  levied  an  army 
of  officers.  Its  operations  were  great,  constant,  and  manifold. 
Nearly  everything  that  one  could  eat,  or  wear,  or  drink,  or  in 
any  way  use,  was  liable  to  some  taxation  or  other.  All  the 
multiform  transactions  under  the  Law  of  Merchants  were 
taxed;  all  the^ast  and  varied  operations  of  trade,  commerce, 
speculation,  were  required  to  materially  assist  the  government; 
all  transfers  of  real  estate  \vere  placed  in  the  same  category. 
These  internal  taxes  were  universal  in  application,  and  they 
were  enormous  in  amount. 

But  this  was  not  all.  Tariffs  upon  imported  merchandise 
were  from  time  to  time  increased  by  Congress  until  the  limit 
of  endurance  on  the  part  of  even  the  most  lofty  patriotism 
may  be  said  to  have  been  reached.  It  might  appear  to  be  self- 
evident  that,  immediately  upon  the  return  of  peace,  there  was 
urgent  demand  for  reform  of  the  revenue  laws.  War  taxes 
may  not  be  justly  levied  upon  a  people  at  peace. 

Accordingly,  the  formation  of  a  new  party  was  considered 
as  a  pressing  demand  of  the  times  by  some  of  the  best  minds 
of  the  country.  The  ideas  of  the  representative  men  of  the 
new  movement  were,  briefly:  That  the  Republican  party  had 
performed  its  mission,  and,  with  the  accomplishment  of  its 
great  ideas,  should  pass  into  honourable  history;  that  the 
Democratic  party  had  degenerated  into  a  fossil  remain  into 
wliich  it  was  impossible  to  breathe  a  living  BOU!;  that  the  sya- 


"REVENUE  REFORM."  515 

tern  of  taxation,  whether  through  the  operation  of  internal 
revenue  exactions  or  tariffs,  ought  to  be  at  once  reformed; 
that  radical  reforms  in  the  civil  service  of  the  government 
were  necessary  for  the  conduct  of  the  public  business  and  the 
existence  of  political  integrity.  These  enunciations  and  their 
logical  corollaries  formed  a  platform  or  series  of  dogmas 
upon  which,  it  was  believed,  a  new  party,  with  reasonable  pros- 
pects of  success,  could  be  organized,  and  ought  to  be. 

Several  influential  journals  sympathized  with  the  movement. 
The  New-York  Evening  Post  was  among  them;  and  a  proposed 
reform  receiving  the  advocacy  of  a  journal  of  which  William 
Cullen  Bryant  was  editor,  at  once  became  entitled  to  respect. 
The  Chicago  Tribune,  The  Cincinnati!  Commercial,  The 
Springfield  Republican,  The  St.  Louis  Republican  among  great 
daily  journals  gave  encouragement  to  the  contemplated  organi- 
zation, whilst  the  ablest  weekly  newspaper  of  the  times,  The 
Nation,  bade  it  hospitable  welcome.  Many  able  men  in  public 
life  declared  that  there  was  necessity  for  reforms,  and  doubted 
their  success  except  with  the  success  of  a  new  party. 

One  must  needs  speak  of  things  which  have  so  recently  been 
the  subject  of  political  conflict  with  the  fear  of  correction  and 
the  certainty  of  dispute  before  his  mind.  The  truth  seems  to 
be  that  those  who  especially  championed  the  movement  for  a 
new  party  undertook  its  formation  through  the  advocacy  of 
doctrines  pertaining  to  details  rather  than  on  general  princi- 
ples involving  the  progress  of  the  people.  Their  chief  efforts 
were  made  against  high  tariff,  but  their  arguments  went 
rather  to  the  policy  of  this  mode  of  indirect  taxation  than  to 
the  advocacy  of  free  trade  as  a  right  of  the  people.  "  Protec- 
tion of  American  Industry,"  the  juggling  phrase  wherewith 
Henry  Clay  had  described  the  policy  of  high  tariffs  upon 
imported  goods  coming  into  competition  with  those  of  domes- 
tic manufacture, —  as  though  the  right  of  manufactures  to  trade 
were  greater  and  more  important  than  the  right  of  the  people 
to  competition  in  trade, — "  Protection,"  I  say,  was  not  assailed 
by  the  reformers  as  essentially  vicious  in  principle,  subversive 
of  natural  right,  and,  therefore,  unrepublican.  If  the  proposed 
reform  only  goes  to  a  detail,  asked  those  adhering  to  existing 


516  UFE  OF  HORACE  GREELET. 

political  organizations,  why  not  bring  it  about  in  the  parties 
in  being?  Great  reforms,  they  insisted,  must  be  based  upon 
great  truths.  Hampden  did  not  inaugurate  the  English  Revo- 
lution because  of  an  exorbitant  tax,  but  because  the  tax  was 
unjust.  He  did  not  war  against  the  payment  of  pounds,  shil- 
lings, and  pence,  but  against  an  act  subverting  popular  right. 
It  was  in  vain  that  the  reformers  assailed  enormous  taxes  and 
high  tariffs  simply  because  they  were  enormous  and  high. 
The  ready  reply  was:  "Very  well;  how  are  we  to  pay  the 
immense  amount  that  the  war  has  charged  up  against  us  with- 
out high  taxes?  So  long  as  the  government  needs,  honestly 
needs,  vast  sums  of  money  annually,  we  must  cheerfully  sub- 
mit to  burdensome  exactions.  If  there  is  peculation  in  the 
party  in  power, —  and  peculators  always  find  their  way  into 
the  party  in  power, —  punish,  disgrace  them ;  but  the  fact  that 
taxes  are  high  is  no  sufficient  basis  for  the  formation  of  a  new 
party.  On  the  contrary,  the  fact  of  high  taxes,  they  being 
necessary  in  support  of  government  and  payment  of  debts,  is 
creditable  to  the  party  in  power,  because  showing  its  courage 
to  do  right  against  unreasonable  clamour." 

There  was  no  answer  to  this  statement  of  the  case  on  the 
plan  of  ratiocination  adopted  by  the  reformers  generally.  The 
true  answer  to  it  was,  that  the  taxes  were  not  only  high,  bnt 
many  of  them  were  levied  upon  a  principle  in  antagonism  with 
freedom,  subversive  of  just  government.  Such  is  the  plan  of 
high  tariffs  with  the  object  of  curtailing  the  people's  right  to 
competition  in  trade.  No  tax,  in  support  of  the  government, 
the  government  being  justly  and  honestly  conducted,  is  wrong- 
ful, if  levied  according  to  the  forms  of  law.  To  compel  the 
people  by  force  of  law  to  support  establishments  which  have  no 
possible  governmental  attributes:  neither  legislative,  execu- 
tive, nor  judicial:  is  of  the  essence  of  despotic  power.  So  far 
as  it  goes,  it  is  wholly  destructive  of  free  government.  It 
may  be  better  than  free  government,  if  you  please  to  think  so. 
It  may  be  corporationism,  or  companyism,  or  combinationism, 
or  paternal  government;  but  it  is  not  free  government.  It  is 
anything  else  but  that. 

If  the  reformers  did  not  go  to  the  root  of  the  matter,  it  is  to 


"REVENUE  REFORM."  517 

be  observed  that  there  was  some  excuse  for  the  postponement 
ol  the  argument  upon  radical  principles.  It  would  have  been 
unwise  suddenly  to  repeal  much  of  the  extraordinary  legisla- 
tion enacted  during  the  war,  and  which  had  been  so  long  in 
existence  that  the  aifairs  of  the  people  had  got  to  moving  in 
channels  which  it  were  not  well  abruptly  to  change.  The 
gross  expensiveness  to  the  people  of  the  system  condemned, 
and  many  accompanying  practical  ills,  shown  by  the  reformers, 
were  sufficient  to  justify  gradual  change.  By  and  by  these  facts 
could  be  used  as  arguments  against  the  unjust  system.  It 
might  logically  be  claimed  that  such  gross  expensiveness  and 
so  many  practical  ills  must  of  necessity  have  their  source  in 
injustice  and  wrong. 

Though  it  is  true  the  reformers  did  not  generally  take  the  high 
ground  of  argumentation  here  referred  to  against  what  Mr. 
Clay,  with  sublime  irony,  had  called  "  Protection  of  American 
Industry,"  some  of  our  thinkers  did  so.  Among  these,  though 
he  did  not  join  the  new  party  when  it  came  to  be  formally 
organized,  was  Mr.  William  Lloyd  Garrison,  the  celebrated 
abolitionist.  Mr.  William  Cullen  Bryant  had  long  been  emi- 
nent among  this  school  of  thinkers.  Among  public  men  Mr. 
Carl  Schurz  was  the  ablest  and  clearest  expounder  of  reform 
ideas,  but  Mr.  B.  Gratz  Brown,  of  Missouri,  was  little  behind 
him.  Mr.  David  A.  Wells,  by  many  reports,  essays,  and  arti- 
cles, demonstrated  the  expensive  operations  of  the  vicious 
system.  The  Nation  newspaper  was  a  dignified  and  powerful 
advocate  of  reform,  and,  indeed,  afterwards  declined  to  support 
Mr.  Greeley  for  President  because  of  his  well  known  views 
upon  the  tariff  question.  Mr.  Manton  Marble,  the  real  founder 
of  the  New- York  World  newspaper;  he  who  organized  success 
for  it;  contributed  many  articles  to  his  journal  upon  tbe  sub- 
ject, which  Mr.  Greeley  nor  any  one  else  was  able  to  answer. 
Colonel  Grosvenor,  long  of  The  St.  Louis  Democrat,  published 
a  valuable  volume  upon  Political  Economy  about  the  time  of 
which  we  are  treating.  Not  a  few  gentlemen  of  eminent  abil- 
ity delivered  public  lectures  and  addresses  in  behalf  of  revenue 
reform. 

Other  reforms  to  which  we  have  briefly  referred  were  advo- 


518  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

cated  by  those  who  proposed  to  form  a  new  party.  In  this 
movement,  Mr.  Greeley  at  first  took  no  part.  Indeed,  one  of 
the  leading  ideas  of  its  representative  men  was  indirect  antag- 
onism to  the  teachings  of  his  whole  life.  He  had  written 
more,  spoken  more,  in  behalf  of  "  Protection  "  than  any  of  his 
countrymen.  lie  was  the  representative  man,  par  excellence, 
in  the  United  States,  of  the  doctrine  of  "  Protection."  He  had 
not  only  written  more  in  advocacy  of  that  doctrine  than  any 
American,  but  more  also  in  attack  of  the  opposing  principle 
and  of  its  eminent  defenders.  Some  of  his  editorial  assaults  in 
connection  with  this  subject  upon  Mr.  Bryant,  Mr.  Wells,  and 
other  advocates  of  reform,  were  couched  in  such  terms  as  must 
be  forever  lamented  by  all  who  believe  that  strength  of  argu- 
ment is  never  weakened  by  dignified,  even  chivalric  treatment 
of  opponents  who  have  been  guilty  of  no  unfairness. 

It  was  natural,  therefore,  that  Mr.  Greeley  should  be  opposed 
to  the  "  revenue-reformers,"  as  they  were  called,  and  the  for- 
mation  of  a  new  party,  with  whose  most  distinguished  repre- 
sentative men  and  journals,  free  trade  was  a  cardinal  doctrine. 
It  was  not  until  afterwards,  when  other  questions  of  great  and 
immediate  importance  had  arisen  for  settlement,  and  he  had 
with  his  own  eyes  seen  the  ills  by  which  the  South  was  being, 
as  he  thought,  plucked,  plundered,  and  impoverished,  that  he 
was  persuaded  of  the  necessity  of  the  defeat  of  the  Republican 
party,  and  the  speedy  inauguration  of  many  vital  reforms 
which  could  be  safely  entrusted  only  to  a  new  organization, 
fresh  from  the  people,  and  therefore  quite  sure  to  be  brave 
honest,  faithful,  and  capable. 


CHAPTEE   XXVIII. 

A  TOUR  OF  THE  SOUTH. 

Mr.  Greeley  Visits  Texas — An  Account  of  His  Southern  Tour — Ho 
Emphatically  Assails  "The  Carpet-Baggers"  as  a  Class — The  Effect 
of  the  Tour  Upon  His  Political  Opinions. 

EARLY  in  the  Summer  of  1871,  Mr.  Greeley  visited  Texas,  for 
the  purpose  of  delivering  an  agricultural  address  at  the  city 
of  Houston.  It  is  not  possible  that  he  would  have  made  a 
journey  of  fifteen  hundred  miles  for  this  purpose  alone.  He 
desired  to  see,  with  his  own  eyes,  the  actual  situation  of  South- 
ern politics,  of  Southern  society,  and  to  study  the  practical 
operations  of  existing  laws  and  customs. 

He  was  everywhere  received  with  great  hospitality  and 
eclat.  His  presence  at  Houston  brought  thither  a  vast  number 
of  people,  among  them  thousands  who  had  for  many  years 
regarded  him  as  the  arch-enemy  of  the  South  among  all  the 
people  of  the  North,  but  who  had  been  led  to  reconsider  their 
harsh  judgments,  chiefly  on  account  of  his  early  and  persistent 
demand  of  universal  amnesty  for  all  political  offenses. 

It  soon  appeared  from  Mr.  Greeley's  utterances,  both  oral 
and  through  The  Tribune,  that  he  was  most  unfavourably 
impressed  with  the  government  of  the  South  by  "carpet- 
baggers," as  those  had  come  to  be  generally  called  who  had 
recently  migrated  to  the  South  from  Northern  States,  and 
adopted  politics  as  their  trade.  The  war  had  devastated  large 
portions  of  the  South;  had  ruined  great  numbers  of  men  who 
had  always  been  accustomed  to  opulence  and  ease.  Emancipa- 
tion had  made  new  systems  of  agriculture,  and  of  labour  gen- 
erally, not  only  desirable  but  necessary.  The  political  power 
gained  by  the  blacks,  lately  slaves,  tended  to  place  the  old 
politicians  in  retirement.  It  is,  indeed,  self-evident  that  there 
could  not  have  been  so  great  a  disturbance,  so  radical  a  revolu- 

(519) 


520  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GREELEY. 

tion,  without  bringing  about  a  state  of  things  the  wise  and 
safe  control  of  which  would  demand  the  best  efforts  of  states 
manship.  Millions  of  persons  suddenly  dispossessed  of  poli- 
tical power  long  exercised;  millions  suddenly  possessed  of 
power  to  which  they  had  never  been  accustomed, — no  land 
ever  passed  through  such  a  revolution  withoat  finding  many 
difficult  questions  to  be  settled,  many  practical  dangers  to  be 
avoided,  many  conflicts  constantly  arising. 

We  may  now  clearly  see,  though  we  may  not  all  have  been 
able  to  see  it  at  the  close  of  the  war, — and  some  may  even  not 
be  able  to  perceive  the  truth  before  the  close  of  the  current 
century, — that  for  the  practical  rehabilitation  of  the  South  two 
things  were  specially  demanded.  These  were:  universal  am- 
nesty for  political  offenses,  and  immigration.  Most  unfortu- 
nately only  one  of  these  demands  of  true  statesmanship  and 
political  economy  was  supplied.  Immigration,  though  so 
highly  desirable  by  the  South,  failed  to  solve  the  Southern 
problem,  which,  aided  by  amnesty,  it  might  have  solved,  and 
probably  would  have  done. 

It  is  always  unwise  to  have  an  element  of  discontent  in 
political  society.  The  poorest  possible  use  to  which  men  can 
'be  put  is  to  make  martyrs  of  them.  This  is  precisely  what 
was  done  with  thousands  of  men  in  every  Southern  State  who 
were  familiar  with  affairs,  with  the  habits  and  customs  of  the 
people,  and  with  the  laws.  There  were  thousands  of  such  men 
in  every  one  of  those  commonwealths  who,  the  war  over, 
"accepted  the  situation"  with  all  candour  and  honesty.  By 
their  experience  and  knowledge  they  were  better  fitted  for  the 
conduct  of  public  affairs  than  the  emancipated  blacks.  For 
the  same  duty  strangers  in  the  land  could  not  compare  with 
them.  It  were  barely  possible  that  these  would  undertake  to 
more  certainly  insure  the  new  rights  of  the  blacks,  better  to 
provide  for  their  education,  etc.;  but  for  the  general  good, 
men  who  are  native  and  to  the  manor  born  can  better  legislate 
than  strangers. 

I  know  of  no  one  argument  which  is  more  conclusive  of 
Horace  Greeley's  remarkable  foresight  and  statesmanship  than 
is  to  be  found  in  the  ills  of  that  system  of  government  which 


"  CAKPET-BAGGERS."  521 

will  be  perfectly  understood  by  the  word  "  carpet-bagism." 
After  the  war  there  was  a  considerable  immigration  to  the 
South.  The  immigrants  largely  engaged  in  politics.  They 
became  possessed  of  political  power.  A  noted  public  man 
called  them  "  carpet-baggers,"  and  the  word  has  become  fixed  in 
our  political  nomenclature.  Southern  citizens  being  deprived 
of  political  privileges,  to  great  extent,  the  blacks  being  unfitted 
quite  generally  for  public  position,  adventurers  from  the  North 
suddenly  came  in  possession  of  the  political  power  of  most  of 
the  Southern  States.  And  with  the  most  lamentable  result. 
If  carpet-bagism  has  yet  been  responsible  for  a  single  Senator 
of  the  United  States  or  Representative  in  Congress  of  respect- 
ble  abilities  or  character  I  do  not  now  think  of  his  name. 
But  its  great  evils  were  manifested  in  the  local  governments, 
State  and  municipal,  and  by  officers  of  the  United  States  of  this 
kind  sent  South  by  the  President,  the  Senate  consenting.  A 
history  of  this  carpet-bagism  is  a  record  of  shameful  pecula- 
tions, of  daring  frauds,  of  shameless  robberies  of  common- 
wealths. Not  the  Norman  conquerors  after  the  battle  of  Hast- 
-ings,  not  Pizarro  and  his  lieutenants  in  Peru,  paid  less  heed 
to  the  rights  of  the  peoples  they  plundered  and  ruined  than  our 
American  Knights  of  the  carpet-bag.  The  process  must  have 
been  all  the  more  unpleasant  to  the  South  because  unredeemed 
by  a  single  gleam  of  chivalry,  or  even  by  a  single  deed  of 
ferocious  courage.  Neither  the  Saxons  nor  the  poor  Peruvians 
were  ever  so  humiliated  as  this. 

When  Mr.  Greeley  visited  the  South,  the  ills  of  government 
by  irresponsible  strangers  had  become  manifest  not  only  in 
the  retardation  of  the  physical  development  of  the  country, 
but  by  an  unhappy,  a  dangerous  condition  of  public  sentiment. 
No  argument  against  slavery  could  be  stronger  than  the  fact 
that  the  late  slaves  generally  took  sides  with  the  carpet- 
baggers against  their  late  masters.  It  makes  no  difference  that 
they  were  imposed  upon  by  the  adventurers.  This  only  shows 
that  slavery  had  given  them  a  dangerous  capacity  of  being 
imposed  upon.  But  this  is  not  all.  They  went  with  the  carpet- 
baggers because  the  carpet-baggers  had  never  enslaved  them. 
Their  unhappiness  in  slavery,  their  real  discontent,  notwith- 


522  IIFE  OF    HOEAOE   GREELEY. 

standing  all  that  has  been  said  and  sung  to  the  contrary,  must 
be  taken  as  demonstrated  by  the  fact  that  they  preferred  to 
their  late  owners  as  friends,  allies,  and  coadjutors,  a  horde 
of  as  graceless,  vulgar  adventurers  as  ever  infested  any  land. 

All  these  evils  of  carpet-bagism,  the  resultant  ills  of  slavery, 
the  misfortunes  that  had  sprung  from  the  want  of  amnesty, 
Mr.  Greeley  studied  carefully  and  candidly.  His  conclusion 
was  such  as  to  cause  him  emphatically  to  assail  the  carpet- 
baggers as  the  chief  obstacle  in  the  way  of  Southern  pacifica- 
tion, happiness,  and  prosperity.  He  did  not  deny  that  there 
were  thousands  of  men  in  the  South,  recently  from  the  "North, 
who  were  valuable  citizens.  These  were  generally  engaged  in 
agriculture,  trade,  manufacture,  taking  no  prominent  part  in 
politics.  But  those  who  had  become  politicians  were,  as  a 
class,  justly  censurable,  as  he  thought;  and,  so  thinking,  he 
expressed  his  opinions  with  characteristic  force  and  honesty. 

He  addressed  the  public  at  several  places  in  Texas,  in 
Mississippi,  and  in  other  Southern  States,  on  most  occasions 
speaking  upon  topics  relating  to  the  practical  development  of 
the  material  resources  of  the  South,  rather  than  in  discussion 
of  political  doctrines.  At  some  places  he  advised  Southerners 
to  raise  "more  corn  and  less  cotton;"  and  almost  everywhere 
he  earnestly  advocated  the  establishment  of  domestic  manu- 
factures. In  every  instance  he  spoke  strongly  and  eloquently 
in  behalf  of  the  duty  and  the  necessity  of  the  return  of  thorough 
harmony  and  good  feeling  between  the  people  of  the  two  sec- 
tions lately  at  war. 

Upon  his  return  to  New- York,  he  was  invited  to  address  the 
Lincoln  Club,  and  did  so  on  the  evening  of  June  12th.  This 
speech  is  of  value,  both  biographical  and  political.  I  therefore 
quote  largely  from  it.  Mr.  Greeley  began  by  saying  that  he 
had  been  invited  to  deliver  an  agricultural  address  at  Houston, 
Texas,  but  had  peremptorily  declined.  Being  earnestly  pressed 
by  many  prominent  business  men  of  New- York  to  reconsider 
Ins  determination,  they  insisting  that  he  might  by  a  tour  of  the 
South  render  the  country  a  real  service,  he  was  persuaded  to 
do  so.  With  this  explanation  he  proceeded  to  speak  of  the 
late  war,  saying  that  he  had  everywhere  argued  that  from 


IN   TEXAS.  523 

beginning  to  end  the  national  government  had  occupied  the 
defensive  position.  Having  dwelt  at  some  length  upou  this 
point,  he  proceeded: 

Now,  then,  I  went  to  Texas  to  deliver  an  agricultural  address  at  Houston, 
and  I  delivered  it.  That  was  rny  work  and  it  was  done-  But  on  my  way 
down  a  club  of  Union  soldiers  now  living  in  New  Orleans,  pressed  me  to 
make  a  speech  to  them  in  their  club-room,  and  I  did  so.  I  attempted  in 
that  speech,  to  vindicate  the  right  of,  this  nation,  this  republic,  to  that  vast 
territory  purchased  by  her  money,  and  defended  by  the  blood  of  her  sons; 
organized  into  States  by  her  Congress,  and  so  made  an  integral  portion  of 
this  American  Republic.  I  argued  that  the  southern  part  of  the  Mississippi 
valley  could  not  possibly  wish  to  be  separated  from  the  northern  part  by 
two  menacing  lines  of  frowning  fortresses  and  hostile  Custom  Houses.  I 
urged, — as  I  always  have  believed, — that  never  did  the  people  living  on 
the  Lower  Mississippi,  in  their  sober  senses,  seek  to  be  divorced  and  alien- 
ated from  the  people  of  the  Upper  Mississippi ;  and  I  affirmed  the  right 
of  the  American  people  to  navigate  the  great  river  from  the  Rocky  Moun- 
tains to  the  Gulf,  unembarrassed  and  unimpeded  by  any  boom  across  its 
channel  or  by  any  gunboats  stationed  there  to  cause  vessels  to  heave-to  for 
Custom  House  scrutiny  and  examination.  So  I  talked  because  I  so 
believed. 

Then,  again,  visiting  the  little  city  of  Columbus,  Texas,  the  only  place  I 
did  visit  on  the  western  side  of  the  Colorado  river, — I  was,  about  this 
time  of  night,  while  sitting  in  my  hotel,  waited  upon  by  a  German  depu- 
tation, who  asked  me  to  come  over  to  their  club-room  and  talk  to  them  a 
little  while,  they  being  all  loyal  Union  men.  Well,  I  went  over.  They 
had  an  hastily  assembled  crowd,  and  I  spoke  for  half  an  hour,  perhaps,  in 
vindication  and  explanation  of  the  late  great  struggle  for  unity  in  this 
country  and  for  unity  in  Germany;  for  the  defense  and  protection  of  these 
two  great  nations  in  their  rights  of  territory  and  nationality.  I  argued, 
as  w«ll  as  I  could,  that  though  some  men  honestly  believe  that  our 
struggle  and  the  triumph  therein  of  the  national  cause  will  tend  to  despot- 
ism on  this  continent,  and  that  some  so  hold  with  regard  to  the  German 
triumph  in  their  great  struggle,  I  on  the  contrary,  believe  that  the  ultimate 
tendency  and  result  of  these  two  great  consummations  will  be  the  promo- 
tion and  advancement  of  liberal  ideas  and  institutions  alike  in  the  Old 
World  and  the  New. 

Well,  gentlemen,  as  I  was  leaving  Texas,  a  pressing  invitation  was  given 
me  by  the  Republicans  of  Galveston  to  make  a  speech  to  them  on  the  last 
night  I  spent  in  their  State,  and  I  acceded  to  their  request.  I  tried  before 
them  to  vindicate  the  North  against  the  charges  made  against  her  in  the 
South,  and  to  prove  that  the  North  did  not  make  war  on  the  South  (as  too 
many  Southern  people  still  believe  she  did).  I  tried  to  show  them  that  the 
war  was  commenced  in  the  South,  by  the  South, — nay,  in  Texas  itself, — by 
capturing,  through  treachery,  the  United  States  army  and  turning  its  arms 
and  munitions  against  the  flag  and  against  the  integrity  of  our  country ;  and 


524:  LIPE   OF   HORACE  GBEELET. 

that,  all  the  -way  through,  we  stood  virtually  on  the  defensive  against  what 
seemed  to  me  a  most  indefensible  and  wanton  aggression.  I  said  what  I 
could  to  vindicate  the  North  from  the  reproach  of  malignity — of  wishing 
to  oppress,  or  plunder,  or  cripple  the  South,  and  tried  to  make  my  South- 
ern countrymen  believe  that  we  were  all  Americans,  and  altogether  inter- 
ested and  striving  for  the  prosperity  and  the  growth  of  our  whole  widely- 
extended  country.  [Applause.]  Such  was  my  theme  at  Galveston. 

Well,  gentlemen,  I  have  heard  it  objected  that,  in  my  speech  at  New 
Orleans  I  asserted  that  if  there  had  been  universal  amnesty  four  years 
ago,  there  would  have  been  no  Ku-Klux  in  1871.  I  do  not  think  I  said 
exactly  that;  but  I  did  say  that  I  regarded  the  policy  of  excluding  from 
office  the  leading  men  of  the  South  as  a  very  great  mistake,  and  a  very 
great  injury  to  the  national  cause  and  to  the  Republican  party.  1  said  no 
more  than  General  Sickles  had  said  in  substance  four  years  earlier,  when 
he  was  Military  Governor  of  South  Carolina,  and  declared  that  he  was 
crippled  and  enfeebled  in  his  efforts  to  govern  that  State  well  by  the  fact 
that  her  best  men,  her  most  considerate  and  conservative  men,  were  not 
available  to  him  as  magistrates,  because  of  an  exclusion  whereof  Andrew 
Johnson  was  the  author.  He  .said :  "  I  cannot  govern  South  Carolina  as 
well  as  I  could  if  I  were  able  to  choose  the  best  men  to  help  me  instead 
of  the  second-best."  I  am  entirely  of  that  conviction.  I  believe  it  was  a 
mistake,  when  you  allowed  a  million  of  Confederates  to  vote  for  members 
of  Congress,  to  deny  them  the  right  to  vote  for  just  such  men  as  they  pre- 
ferred. I  believe,  therefore,  the  best  men  would  be  safer  and  more  useful 
in  Congress  than  their  second-rate  men ;  better  for  us  and  better  for  their 
country.  [Applause.]  So  I  argued  because  I  so  believed;  and  still  I  say 
that  if  the  men  were  allowed  to  represent  the  South  who  express  the 
sentiment  of  the  South — if  the  Toombses,  Wises,  and  Wade  Hamptons  had 
been  allowed  to  go  to  Congress,  and  had  been  sent  there  four  years  ago, 
the  Republican  party  would  have  been  a  great  deal  stronger,  and  recon- 
struction  very  much  further  advanced  and  more  certain  than  it  is  to-day. 
*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  * 

But  I  have  been  asked,  "Are  there  any  Ku-Klux  down  South?"  Yes,, 
gentlemen,  there  are.  They  didn't  come  up  to  me  and  tell  me  they  were 
Ku-Klux  very  often.  [Laughter.]  They  didn't  undertake  to  perform  their 
delicate  operations  on  me.  I  should  have  had  very  much  more  respect  for 
them  if  they  had.  *  *  *  I  hold  our  government  bound  by  its  duty  of 
protecting  our  citizens  in  their  fundamental  rights,  to  pass  and  enforce 
laws  for  the  extirpation  of  the  execrable  Ku-Klux  conspiracy ;  and  if  it 
has  not  power  to  do  it,  then  I  say  our  government  is  no  government,  but 
a  sham.  I,  therefore,  on  every  proper  occasion,  advocated  and  justified 
the  Ku-Klux  act.  I  hold  it  especially  desirable  for  the  South ;  and,  if  it 
does  not  prove  strong  enough  to  effect  its  purpose,  I  hope  it  will  be  made 
stronger  and  stronger.  *  *  *  Fellow-citizens,  the  Ku-Klux  arc  no 
myth,  although  they  shroud  themselves  in  darkness.  They  are  no  flitting 
ghosts;  they  are  a  baneful  reality.  They  have  paralyzed  the  right  of 
suffrage  in  many  counties  throughout  the  South,  and  carried  Slates  that 


"THE  THIEVING  CABINET-BAGGERS."  525 

they  ought  not  to  have  carried.    But  they  are  not  the  only  enemies  to 
republican  ascendancy  in  the  South. 

There  is  another  influence  equally  injurious  with  theirs,  aud  a  great 
deal  more  detrimental  to  the  fame  and  character  of  the  Republican  party. 
I  allude  to  what  are  known  as  the  "  thieving  carpet-baggers."  [Applause.] 
Fellow-citizens,  do  not  mistake  me.  All  the  Northern  men  in  the  South 
are  not  thieves.  The  larger  part  of  them  are  honest  men,  some  of  whom 
stay  there  at  the  peril  of  their  lives  because  they  believe  it  to  be  their 
duty.  Next  to  the  noble  and  true  women  who  have  gone  down  South  to 
teach  black  children  how  to  read,  nobler  there  are  not  on  the  earth  tha%. 
these,  whom  a  stupid,  malignant,  dilapidated  aristocracy  often  sees  fit  to 
crowd  into  negro  hovels  to  live,  not  allowing  them  to  enter  into  any  white 
society  because  they  are  teaching  negro  children — next  to  these,  who  rank 
as  the  noblest  women  in  the  South,  are  the  honest  and  worthy  Northern 
men  who,  in  the  face  of  social  proscription  and  general  obloquy  and 
scorn,  stand  firmly  by  the  Republican  cause. 

The  public  is  often  heedlessly  unjust.  Let  a  government  have  10,000 
jiHcial  subordinates  in  power,  of  whom  9,900  are  honest  and  true  men, 
who  do  their  duty  faithfully,  while  hardly  100  are  robbers  and  swindlers, 
the  public  will  hear  a  great  deal  more  about  the  100  robbers  than  about 
the  9,900  true  men.  The  100  stand  out  in  the  public  eye;  they  are  always 
doing  something  which  exposes  them  to  the  scornful  gaze  of  the  multi- 
tude, while  the  honest  and  true  men  pass  along,  silent  and  unobserved, 
and  nothing  is  said,  very  little  is  thought  of  them.  All  attention  is  con- 
centrated upon  the  100  who  are  defaulting  and  stealing  and  forging,  and 
running  away. 

Well,  gentlemen,  "the  thieving  carpet-baggers"  are  a  mournful  fact; 
they  do  exist  there,  and  I  have  seen  them.  [Laughter.]  They  are  fellows 
who  crawled  down  South  in  the  track  of  our  armies,  generally  a  very  safe 
distance  in  the  rear,  some  of  them  on  sutlers'  wagons ;  some  of  them  bear- 
ing cotton  permits;  some  of  them  looking  sharply  to  see  what  might  turn 
up ;  and  they  remain  there.  They  at  once  ingratiated  themselves  with  the 
blacks — simple,  credulous,  ignorant  men,  very  glad  to  welcome  and  follow 
any  whites  who  professed  to  be  the  champions  of  their  rights.  Some  of 
these  got  elected  Senators,  others  Representatives,  some  Sheriffs,  some 
Judges,  and  so  on.  And  there  they  stand  right  in  the  public  eye,  stealing 
and  plundering,  many  of  them  with  both  arms  around  negroes  and  their 
hands  in  their  rear  pockets  seeing  if  they  cannot  pick  a  paltry  dollar  out 
of  them.  And  the  public  looks  at  them ;  does  not  regard  the  honest 
Northern  man,  but  calls  every  "carpet-bagger"  a  thief,  which  is  not  the 
truth  by  a  good  deal.  But  these  fellows— many  of  them  long-faced  and 
with  eyes  rolled  up — are  greatly  concerned  for  the  education  of  the  blacks 
and  for  the  salvation  of  their  souls.  [Great  laughter.]  "  Let  us  pray," 
they  say.  But  they  spell  pray  with  an  e,  and,  thus  spelled,  they  obey  the 
apostolic  injunction  to  "pray  without  ceasing." 

Fellow-citizens,  the  time  has  been  and  still  is  when  it  was  perilous  to  be 
known  as  a  Republican  or  an  Abolitionist  in  the  South,  but  it  never  called 


526  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

the  blush  of  shame  to  any  man's  cheek  to  be  so  called  until  these  thieving 
carpet-baggers  went  there; — never.  [Applause.]  They  got  into  the  Legis- 
latures. They  went  to  issuing  State  bonds.  They  pretended  to  use  them 
in  aid  of  railroads  and  other  improvements.  But  the  improvements  were 
not  made,  and  the  bonds  stuck  in  the  issuers'  pockets.  [Laughter.]  That 
is  the  pity  of  it. 

"  Well,"  some  say,  "you  have  such  thieves  at  the  North."  Yes,  we  do, 
too  many  of  them  [applause],  but  the  South  was  already  impoverished, 
was  bankrupt,  without  money,  without  thrift,  almost  without  food,  and 
n^these  fellows  went  there  robbing  and  swindling  when  there  was  very  little 
to  steal  and  taking  the  last  ten-cent  shinplaster  off  the  dead  men's  eyes. 
They  were  recognized  by  the  late  aristocracy  not  merely  as  thieves  but  as 
enemies.  Says  Byron's  Greek  minstrel 

"A  tyrant  —  but  onr  masters  then, 
Were  still  at  least  our  countrymen." 

Thus  we  record  the  men  who  annually  rob  us  at  Albany,  at  Trenton, 
and  at  Harrisburgh.  They  do  not  carry  their  plunder  out  of  the  State 
when  they  get  any.  These  fellows  do!  The  South  was  not  merely  defeated 
in  the  late  contest;  she  was  profoundly  astonished  by  the  result.  Her 
people  have  not  fairly  got  over  their  amazement  at  their  defeat,  and  what 
they  see  of  us  are  these  thieves  who  represent  the  North  to  their  jaundiced 
vision  and,  representing  it,  they  disgrace  it.  They  are  the  greatest  obsta- 
cles to  the  triumph  and  permanent  ascendancy  of  Republican  principles 
at  the  South,  and  as  such  I  denounce  them.  [Applause.] 

********** 

But,  gentlemen,  my  voice  fails,  yet  I  want  to  say  a  few  words  about  the 
New  Departure.  [Laughter.]  When  men  are  in  a  bad  fix  I  reckon  they 
had  better  depart  from  it,  and  I  fully  justify  thosje  Democrats  who  have 
determined  to  depart  from  the  foolish  old  business  of  running  their  heads 
against  a  stone  wall.  If  I  were  these  I  should  depart,  and  I  think  it  well 
for  them  to  do  it ;  and  since  they  do  it  I  am  not  inclined  to  criticise  the 
manner  tod  severely  nor  to  judge  them  too  harshly.  I  have  made  a  rule 
for  some  time  never  to  conjure  up  a  bad  motive  for  a  good  action.  They 
are  where  they  ought  not  to  be:  they  propose  to  depart,  and  I  think  they 
should. 

Our  Ohio  friends  do  not  take  quite  so  charitable  a  view  of  the  new 
departure  as  I  do.  They  say  there  was  a  particularly  rough  character  once 
who  was  noted  for  violating  the  Sabbath  among  other  bad  deeds.  But 
finally  he  became  converted — "  got  religion,"  and  joined  the  church.  All 
right.  One  day  a  gentleman  came  along  and  asked  a  neighbour  of  his, 
"Do  you  see  any  great  change  in  Nokes,  since  he  joined  the  church?" 
"  O,  yes,  he  used  to  go  out  chopping  Sunday  mornings  with  his  axe  swung 
over  his  shoulder;  now  he  carries  it  under  his  coat."  [Laughter.] 

Gentlemen,  I  am  very  glad  that  the  Democratic  party  has  taken  off  its 
shoulder  the  axe  Which  it  has  wielded  so  many  years  in  deadly  hostility 
to  the  rights  of  the  coloured  race.  I  am  glad  it  has  put  it  under'its  coat, 
but  I  hope  it  will  think  better  of  it  and  put  it  back  into  the  wood-house 


THE  NEW   DEPARTURE.  527 

and  meet  tLo  blacks  with  open  hands  saying,  "we  are  going  to  treat  each 
of  you  just  as  you  shall  deserve  to  be  treated,  no  matter  what  is  tho 
colour  of  your  skin."  I  do  believe  they  mean  this — the  most  of  them. 
I  believe  they  mean  hereafter  to  wear  their  Democracy  something  more 
than  skin  deep.  At  any  rate  I  shall  urge  and  encourage  them  to  do  so. 

Fellow-citizens,  I  would  not  make  too  much  of  the  New  Departure.  I 
do  not  understand  these  gentlemen  even  to  profess  any  penitence  for  their 
past  warfare  against  the  equal  rights  of  men.  I  don't  understand  them 
even  to  promise  that  they  will  never  renew  their  warfare.  I  only  urrtler- 
etand  them  as  pledged  to  this  extent :  They  admit  that  the  three  Republican 
amendments  to  the  Federal  Constitution  are  now  a  part  of  that  Constitu- 
tion and  while  they  are  there  they  must  be  obeyed.  That  I  understand  to 
be  the  extent  of  the  New  Departure  and  I  deem  it  worth  a  good  deal.  So 
.ong  as  they  admit  that  these  amendments  are  in,  I  shall  feel  pretty  sure 
that  they  are  not  likely  to  get  them  out.  I  shall  rest  content  that  the  rights 
of  all  men,  being  citizens  of  the  United  States,  are  safe  under  the  guaran- 
tees of  the  Federal  Constitution. 

Twenty-five  years  ago  I  stood  at  the  polls  of  the  Nineteenth  ward  of  this 
city,  all  one  rainy,  chilly  November  day,  peddling  ballots  for  equal  suffrage. 
I  got  many  Whigs  to  take  them,  but  not  one  Democrat.  Again,  in  1860  — 
not  eleven  years  ago  —  I  again  stood  at  my  polls  all  day,  and  handed  out 
the  same  kind  of  vote,  and  I  do  not  remember  that  a  single  Democrat 
took  one.  Some  Republicans,  even,  would  not  take  them,  but  no  Dem- 
ocrat would. 

I  believe  in  human  progress.  I  believe  that  men  are  rather  wiser  and 
better  to-day  than  they  were  twelve  years  ago ;  and  here  is  proof  of  it.  It 
is  not  two  years  since  our  first  Democratic  State  Legislature  withdrew  the 
consent  given  by  its  Republican  predecessors  to  the  Fifteenth  Amendment, 
and  by  a  party  vote  so  far  as  New  York  could  do  it  they  tried  to  defeat 
that  amendment.  Now  we  have  a  New  Departure.  Was  it  not  high  time  ? 
I  think  it  was. 

Fellow-citizens,  I  am  weary,  weary  of  this  sterile  strife  concerning  the 
fundamental  principles  of  republican  institutions.  I  am  tired  of  trying 
to  teach  the  Democrats  the  A  B  C's  of  democracy.  I  rejoice  to  know  that 
they  have  taken  a  New  Departure,  and  I  tell  you  that  when  they  have 
once  taken  it,  it  will  be  a  great  deal  harder  to  get  back  on  to  the  old 
ground  than  to  go  on.  Some  one  says,  "Isn't  it  going  to  put  the  Republi- 
cans out  of  power?"  I  cannot  tell.  Immediately,  I  think  not.  An 
English  statesman  well  says:  "Confidence  is  a  plant  of  slow  growth ;" 
and  I  think  it  will  take  some  time  for  the  people  to  realize  that  they  mean 
this — some  time  for  their  own  folks  to  realize  it  —  a  great  deal  longer  to 
make  any  black  man  believe  that  they  mean  it. 

I  don't  anticipate  any  sudden  change  in  the  relative  position  of  parties 
because  of  the  New  Departure.     Ultimately,  I  think  it  will  strengthen  tl 
Democrats.    "Then,"  one  says,  "you  will  go  out  of  power."     Yes,  w 
shall,  some  time,  no  doubt.    If  it  be  my  fate  to  go  out  this  moment,  an 
every  year  of  my  life  thereafter  to  be  in  the  minority,  powerless  -md 


528  LIFE  OF   IIOEACE   GKEELEY. 

defeated,  I  should  still  thank  God  most  humbly  and  heartily,  that  He 
allowed  me  to  live  in  an  age  and  to  be  a  part  of  the  generation  that  wit- 
nessed the  downfall  and  destruction  of  American  Slavery.  [Prolonged 
applause.] 

Fellow-citizens,  I  trust  the  day  is  not  distant  wherein,  putting  behind 
us  the  things  that  concern  the  past,  we  shall  remember' that  grand  old 
injunction  of  the  Bible :  "  Speak  to  the  children  of  Israel  that  they  go 
forward."  I  am  weary  of  fighting  over  the  issues  that  ought  to  be  dead, — 
that  legally  were  dead  years  ago.  When  slavery  died  I  thought  that  we 
ought  speedily  to  have  ended  all  that  grew  out  of  it,  by  universal  amnesty 
and  impartial  suffrage.  [Applause.]  I  think  so  still;  and,  if  the  Demo- 
cratic party  concede  Impartial  Suffrage,  the  Republican  party  will  concede 
universal  amnesty;  if  not,  it  will  have  but  a  very  short  lease  of  power.  So, 
then,  friends,  I  summon  you  all,  Republicans  and  Democrats,  to  prepare 
for  the  new  issues,  and  new  struggles  that  visibly  open  before  us.  Iii  the 
times  not  far  distant  we  shall  consider  questions  mainly  of  industrial 
policy — questions  of  national  advancement — questions  involving  the  best 
means  whereby  our  different  parties  may  through  cooperation,  or  through 
rivalry,  endeavour  to  promote  the  prosperity,  the  happiness,  and  the  true 
glory  of  the  American  people.  To  that  contest  I  invite  you.  For  that 
contest  I  would  prepare  you.  And  so,  trusting  that  the  blood  shed  in  the 
past  will  be  a  sufficient  atonement  for  the  sins  of  the  past ;  and  that  we 
are  entering  on  a  New  Departure,  not  for  one  party,  but  for  the  whole 
country — a  departure  from  strife  to  harmony,  from  destruction  to  construc- 
tion, from  desolation  to  peace  and  plenty,  I  bid  you,  friends  and  fellow 
citizens,  an  affectionate  good-night.  [Prolonged  cheers  and  applause.] 

It  is  apparent  from  these  utterances  that  Mr.  Greeley's 
Southern  tour  had  had  a  marked  effect  upon  his*  political 
opinions.  He  had  acquired  no  new  faith  in  the  Democratic 
party;  he  had  lost  confidence  in  the  Republican  organization; 
he  had  begun  to  see  in  the  "  new  party  movement "  a  New 
Departure  of  men  of  all  parties  in  the  interest  of  harmony, 
peace,  happiness  for  the  whole  country. 

He  was  assailed  in  many  quarters  for  his  views  upon  the 
eatpet-baggers,  but  this  only  caused  him  to  reiterate  them  with 
still  greater  emphasis  and  to  adduce  new  facts  showing  their 
baneful  influence  upon  the  South,  and,  by  necessary  conse- 
quence, upon  the  whole  nation.  Believing  that  the  practical 
exclusion  of  the  best  men  of  the  South  from  public  affairs  was 
rrong,  unjust,  anti-republican  in  principle;  perceiving  that 
the  rule  of  the  carpet-baggers  was  ruinous,  impoverishing, 
tending  to  constant  local  strife,  a  constant  menace  to  the  peace 


ON   THE   NEW   DEPARTUKE. 


529 


of  tlie  republic,  dangerous  to  the  welfare  of  the  whole  people; 
judging  that  the  party  in  power  was  committed  to  sustain  the 
carpet-baggers,  and  seeing  that  it  constantly  apologized  for 
their  misgovernment  and  crimes,  the  line  of  duty  with  him 
clearly  lay  in  the  New  Departure.  Having  without  compunc- 
tion given  up  the  Whig  party  when  it  had  outlived  its 
usefulness,  he  now  for  similar  reason  stepped  from  a  narrow 
on  to  a  broad  platform,  and  as  before  with  the  triumph  of  jnst 
principles  and  the  progress  of  the  republic  to  impel  him 
forward  on  his  chosen  course. 

It  is  worthy  of  observation  that  Mr.  Greeley  would,  no 
doubt,  sooner  have  expressed  sympathy  with  the  movement 
for  a  new  party  but  that,  as  we  have  seen,  its  most  eminent 
representative  men  were  noted  advocates  of  free  trade  as  he 
was  a  noted  advocate  of  the  opposing  doctrine.  Upon  those 
other  great  questions  of  pacification  and  governmental  reform 
which  came  to  form  the  platform  of  the  party  he  had  been 
unequivocally  committed,  both  by  word  and  deed,  in  advance 
of  almost  any  of  his  cotemDoraries. 


ALLEN  G.  THURMAN.— Sec  page  533- 


CHAPTER    XXIX. 

A  CANDIDATE  FOR  PRESIDENT  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES. 

Organization  of  the  Liberal  Republican  Party  —  Preliminary  Tactics — 
Debates  in  the  Senate  —  Eminent  Republicans  Join  in  the  Movement 
The  Cincinnati  Convention  —  Candidates  for  Nomination  —  Mr. 
Grecley  Successful — The  National  Democratic  Convention  at  Balti- 
more—  The  Cincinnati  Ticket  Endorsed  —  The  Republican  National 
Convention  and  its  Candidates — The  Canvass  —  Death  of  Mrs.  Greeley 
—  Defeat— At  Work  Again  on  The  Tribune. 

THE  "new-party  movement"  did  not  result  in  the  formation 
of  any  regular  political  organization  until  the  year  1872,  early  in 
May  of  which  year  the  "Liberal"  Republicans  held  a  National 
Convention  in  the  city  of  Cincinnati  and  formally  placed  plat- 
form and  ticket  before  the  country  for  support. 

It  has  already  appeared  that  the  first  movements  made  by 
those  who  proposed  to  themselves  to  institufe  a  radical  reform 
of  parties  were  mainly  conducted  by  free-traders  and  in  the 
interest  of  revenue  reform.  There  were  several  meetings  of 
noted  writers  and  journalists  who  came  together  even  so  early 
as  the  first  year  of  President  Grant's  administration,  with  the 
object  of  informally  discussing  the  question  of  revenue  reform, 
and  these  at  length  resulted  in  a  quite  general  agitation  of  the 
subject  by  the  press  and  the  intelligent  public.  The  argu- 
ments in  behalf  of  the  reform  advocated  by  those  here  spoken 
of  were  heartily  accepted  by  large  numbers  of  Republicans 
and  by  members  of  the  Democratic  party  generally.  The 
former  were  not  yet  ready,  however,  to  abandon  a  political 
organization  whose  history,  as  they  believed,  had  been  mainly 
honourable,  and  had  conferre*!  great  benefit  upon  the  republic 
and  the  cause  of  human  progress. 

The  reform  movement  gradually  gained  popular  strength, 
however,  and,  advocated  by  some  of  the  most  thoughtful  polit- 

(530) 


SENATORS   SUMNER    AND    SCHURZ. 

ical  economists  of  the  nation  and  a  number  of  our  most 
influential,  independent  public  journals,  it  was  entitled  to  the 
considerate  examination  of  statesmen  and  especially  of  public 
men  in  control  of  affairs.  But  it  was  not  brought  into  any 
notable  discussion  in  the  halls  of  Congress  until  the  long  ses- 
sion of  1871-72,  and  then  only,  in  such  way  as  to  receive 
general  attention,  in  the  Senate.  As  a  rule,  the  House  of 
Representatives  proceeded  with  routine  business,  providing 
for  the  coming  campaign,  printing  many  speeches  never 
delivered,  and  skipping  the  questions  a  settlement  of  which 
upon  some  policy  or  other  was  demanded  by  justice,  states- 
manship, and  a  decent  respect  for  the  national  will. 

But  the  debates  in  the  Senate  made  that  chamber  the  scene 
of  greatest  attraction  at  the  National  Capital  during  many 
months.  The  administration  was  attacked  for  certain  alleged 
abuses,  corruptions,  the  exercise  of  unwarranted  powers,  for 
postponing  the  era  of  peace  and  harmony  throughout  the 
country.  Of  Republican  Senators  who  assailed  the  adminis- 
tration of  President  Grant,  Charles  Sumner  was  the  most 
distinguished.  .  He  had  ever  been  a  leading  and  potential 
Republican  not  only,  but  may  be  truthfully  said,  I  think,  to 
have  been  for  many  years  the  most  illustrious  of  American 
statesmen,  the  most  faithful  friend  and  the  most  powerful 
champion  of  human  freedom.  He  assailed  the  administration, 
or  rather  the  President,  with  even  unusual  eloquence  and 
unwonted  indignation.  Senator  Schurz  was  the  great  debater 
of  the  period  in  review.  Not  since  the  elder  time  have  there 
been  so  many  and  so  great  manifestations  of  forensic  powers 
as  were  here  and  now  shown  by  this  remarkable  man.  His 
genius  as  a  statesman  is,  if  I  may  so  speak,  both  of  tele- 
scopic and  microscopic  power.  It  comprehends  great  truths, 
general  systems  of  polity,  with  clearness  and  ease,  and  also 
observes  all  details  and  all  technicalities  without  being  thereby 
either  at  all  beclouded  or  annoyed.  There  are  few  minds  more 
comprehensive  than  his,  few  so  subtle;  and  Ben  Johnson  some- 
where says,  "  He  that  cannot  contract  the  sight  of  his  mind, 
as  well  as  dilate  and  disperse  it,  wanteth  a  great  faculty."  In 
all  the  debates  arising  upon  the  various  investigations  about 


532  LIFE  OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

this  time  made  of  the  conduct  of  officials,  Mr.  Scliurz  appeared 
to  be  perfectly  at  home  as  to  all  the  facts  and  perfectly  familiar 
with  all  the  principles  and  laws,  whether  national  or  interna- 
tional, bearing  upon  them.  In  these  intellectual  combats  he 
was  often  opposed  by  all  the  eminent  men  of  the  administra- 
tion side  of  the  Senate:  by  Mr.  Morton,  the  undoubted  leader 
of  the  Republicans,  a  man  of  vast  mental  powers,  whose  pon- 
derous mind,  the  only  one  on  his  side  of  the  Senate  resembling 
that  of  Daniel  Webster,  though  it  may  not  be  easily  aroused, 
is,  when  set  in  active  motion,  apt  to  make  wide  room  for  its 
almost  resistless  course;  by  Senator  Coukling,  of  New  York, 
a  man  not  only  of  chivalric  bearing  but  of  great  and  brilliant 
powers  of  debate,  whose  clear  and  strong  argumentation  and 
keen  invective  are  set  forth  in  most  magnificent  diction, 
springing  up,  rich  and  fresh,  from  the  well  of  English  unde- 
filed;  by  Senator  Edmunds,  of  Vermont,  a  highly  skilful  and 
very  ready  disputant,  especially  in  questions  of  law;  by 
Senator  Carpenter,  of  Wisconsin,  who  was  happily  stated  by 
Mr.  Benjamin  F.  Butler  to  be  worth  to  a  powerful  corporation 
a  large  annual  retainer  because  "  he  had  a  tongue  in  his  head ;" 
by  Senator  Harlan,  of  Iowa,  whose  strong  argumentation  was 
ever  accompanied  by  the  most  pleasing  suavity  of  manner;  by 
Senator  Wilson,  of  Massachusetts,  who  in  the  Senate  often 
undertook  to  enact  the  role  of  peace-maker,  and  frequently 
made  himself  ridiculous  by  advocating  both  sides  of  the  ques- 
tion at  issue,  and  with  the  most  enjoyable  ignorance  of  his 
preposterous  attitudes,  or,  perhaps  I  should  say,  altitudes;  by 
other  Senators  no  less  distinguished  than  some  of  these; — but 
out  of  the  grand  ineltfe,  the  Senator  from  Missouri  came  tri- 
umphant, like  Ivanhoe  at  the  gentle  and  joyous  Passage  of 
Arms  of  Ashby.  If  there  were  answer  to  many  of  Mr. 
Schurz's  arguments,  it  was  not  then  delivered,  and  has  yet  to 
be  uttered. 

Other  eminent  Republican  Senators  besides  Messrs.  Sumner 
and  Scliurz  approved  the  movement  for  a  reform  party.  Sen- 
ator Trumbull,  of  Illinois,  was  among  the  first  to  take  this 
stand.  The  ablest  constitutional  lawyer  in  the  Senate,  the 
closest,  and,  perhaps,  the  strongest  reasoner,  in  abstract  logic, 


"LIBERAL"  SENATORS.  533 

in  that  body,  he  had  for  years  been  known  by  those  who  knew 
public  men  best  as  the  steadiest  statesman  among  all  the  emi- 
nent men  of  the  Republican  party.  In  the  most  exciting  times 
he  maintained  his  presence  of  mind.  In  no  turmoil  and  amid 
no  clamour  did  the  clearness  and  strength  of  his  judgment 
ever  for  an  instant  desert  him.  His  influence  had  been  firmly 
impressed  upon  much  of  the  best  legislation  of  his  country, 
and  he  had  long  commanded  universal  respect  not  only  on 
account  of  his  great  abilities  but  also  because  of  his  irreproach- 
able personal  character.  Whatever  might  be  said  of  others,  it 
was  agreed  that  Lyman  Trumbull  was  sans  peur  et  sans  reproche. 
Into  the  debates  of  this  period  he  entered  with  great  spirit  and 
even  unwonted  power. 

Senator  Fenton,  of  New  York,  may  be  described  as  the 
incarnation  of  suavity.  Among  living  public  men,  he  is  the 
most  accomplished  courtier.  He  has  the  genius  of  courtesy. 
The  President  of  the  United  States,  if  put  to  his  corporal  oath, 
and  others  familiar  with  New  York  politics,  might  testify  that 
behind  Mr.  Fenton's  fascinating  manners  there  sometimes  was 
hidden  a  double-deal.  And  yet  it  is  probable,  if  they  knew 
all,  —  if  they  fully  appreciated  Mr.  Fenton's  real  unwillingness 
to  give  offense,  —  they  would  acquit  him  of  any  deceit  more 
than  is  involved  in  the  necessary  hypocrisy  of  the  highest 
good-breeding.  In  the  animated  debates  of  this  famous  session 
ol  1871-72,  Senator  Fenton  took  honourable  part,  and  on  one 
or  two  occasions  exhibited  great  powers  of  eloquence  and  of 
argument.  But  it  is  probably  true  that  he  laboured  more 
effectively  in  marking  out  the  campaign  than  in  the  active 
operations. 

Senator  Thomas  W.  Tipton,  of  Nebraska,  took  earnest  part 
in  the  debates,  humorously  assailing  the  administration  on 
many  accounts,  both  general  and  special.  Senator  John  A. 
Logan,  of  Illinois,  maintained  an  unnatural  silence  until  after 
the  Cincinnati  Convention.  Democratic  Senators  did  not  feel 
it  to  be  their  duty  to  take  active  part  in  the  debates,  but  Sen- 
ator Blair  openly  sympathized  with  the  new  party  movement, 
while  Senator  Thurman,  of  Ohio,  the  ablest  man  the  Demo 
cratic  party  has  had  in  Congress  for  many  years,  now  and  then 


534  LIFE  OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

joined  in  the  discussions,  and  always  in  such  way  as  to  make 
the  candid  think  that,  if  his  party  wonld  truly  accept  him  as 
a  representative  man,  it  might  still  live  and  be  of  benefit  t« 
the  republic. 

Eminent  Bepublicans  in  different  parts  of  the  country  now 
joined  in  the  reform  movement.  It  is  a  remarkable  fact,  worthy 
the  careful  study  of  those  who  would  fully  understand  andJion- 
estly  judge  not  only  of  the  political  history  of  the  period 
under  consideration,  but  of  Mr.  Greeley's  candidacy  for  our 
highest  office,  that  very  many  of  those  who  had  been  leading 
men  in  the  Republican  party;  who  had  been  abolitionists  when 
it  was  almost  as  much  as  one's  life  was  worth  to  be  an  aboli- 
tionist;—  that  very  many  of  these  were,  in  1872,  convinced 
of  the  demoralization  and  corruption  of  the  party  in  power. 

Mr.  John  W.  Forney,  of  The  Philadelphia  P^ess,  gave  nota- 
ble testimony  to  this  fact  very  early  in  the  year.  There  had 
been  no  truer  Republican,  no  braver  friend  of  freedom  than 
he.  During  the  war  and  for  some  years  afterwards  he  resided 
at  the  National  Capital,  where  also  he  conducted  a  daily  jour- 
nal. His  warfare  with  President  Johnson  makes  an  almost 
unique  instance  of  independence  and  pluck  in  Washington 
journalism  since  the  death  of  Dr.  Bailey  of  the  old  National 
Era.  He  now  resigned  the  profitable  office  of  Collector  of  the 
Port  of  Philadelphia,  that  he  might  be  untrammelled  as  an 
editor,  and  at  once  proceeded  to  chastise  "  the  party  "  for  the 
illiberalism  of  many  of  its  defenders  and  especially  for  their 
assaults  upon  eminent  Republicans  who  demanded  the  reform 
and  purification  of  the  party,  even  if  to  reform  and  purity  it  it 
should  become  necessary  to  overthrow  it. 

In  every  State  there  were  large  numbers  of  Republicans 
•who  sustained  the  rebellious  Senators  in  very  much  that  they 
did,  and  not  a  few  who  expressed  the  opinion  that  the  best 
interests  of  the  country  demanded  the  defeat  of  the  adminis- 
tration through  the  means  of  a  new  political  organization.  It 
is  true  that  many  of  these  held  the  President  in  high  esteem ; 
doubted  neither  his  personal  nor  his  political  integrity.  They 
believed  he  was  surrounded  by  advisers  whose -counsel  was 
pernicious;  who  made  a  trade  of  politics;  and,  utterly  unprin- 


MR.    VALLANDIGHAM.  535 

cipled,  used  the  President  to  the  detriment  of  the  nation,  the 
scandal  of  statesmanship,  and  the  corruption  of  political 
morals.  He  would  be  more  than  a  brave  man  who  should  say 
there  were  not  many  reasons  for  this  opinion.  - 

There  was  also  a  strong  tendency  toward  "  the  New  Depart- 
ure" in  the  Democratic  party.  The  first  notable  impulse  in 
this  direction  was  given  by  the  celebrated  Clement  L.  Vallan- 
digham,  of  Ohio.  Mr.  Yallandigham  had  made  himself 
excessively  unpopular  during  the  war.  He  had  rendered  moral 
aid  and  comfort  to  the  rebellion.  The  conscientiousness  of 
his  conduct  in  no  wise  excused  its  culpability.  Conscience,  as 
well  as  reason  itself,  may  be  so  abused  as  to  cease  to  perform 
its  proper  functions.  The  greatest  criminal  of  history:  the 
criminal  justly  chargeable  with  the  shedding  of  the  most 
innocent  blood,  the  subversion  of  the  most  right,  and  the 
accomplishment  of  the  most  wrong:  the  right  name  of  this 
greatest  of  criminals  is  Perverted  Conscience.  During  the 
war  Mr.  Yallandigham  was  culpably  in  the  wrong.  Neverthe- 
less, the  very  vehemence  of  his  feelings  against  a  Union  based 
upon  force  caused  him  to  welcome  peace,  even  upon  terms  which, 
earlier,  he  would  have  thought  could  not  have  been  procured 
by  any  triumph  that  could  have  been  gained.  From  this  to  the 
demand  of  a  Union  based  upon  perfect  freedom,  homogeneity, 
harmony, — precluding  the  probability  of  another  conflict  of 
arms,  —  was  but  a  logical  step.  If  Mr.  Vallandigham  had 
been  unpatriotic  in  his  opposition  to  the  government  in  a  war 
which  had  been  forced  upon  it,  he  did  what  could  be  done  to 
redeem  his  error  by  agreeing  to  all  the  terms  demanded  by  the 
victors.  A  man  of  wonderful  energy,  of  great  power  as  a 
public  speaker,  he  gave  his  whole  soul,  as  it  were,  to  the  cause 
of  "  the  New  Departure,"  and  it  was  not  long  till  many  Dem- 
ocrats were  known  heartily  to  coincide  with  his  views.  His 
untimely  death,  under  circumstances  of  such  singular  sadness, 
must  be  regarded  as  unfortunate  to  his  reputation  and  to  his 
country.  It  may  be  judged  as  certain  that  had  he  lived  a  few 
years  longer  he  would  have  accomplished  much  that  is  good 
And  great  both  for  one  and  the  other. 

The  next  most-  notable  utterance,  perhaps,  in  behalf  of  the 


536  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GKEELEY. 

New  Departure,  within  the  Democratic  party,  was  that  of  The 
Missouri  Republican  newspaper.  Though  named  "Repub- 
lican," this  journal  had  for  years  been  one  of  the  most  widely 
circulated  and  influential  of  Democratic  journals  in  the  "West. 
Singularly  enough,  the  Republican  journal  of  most  note  in  St. 
Louis  was  named  The  Democrat.  The  Republican  advocated 
the  abandonment  of  the  Democratic  organization  and  the  for- 
mation of  a  new  party,  with  great  power.  The  State  of 
Missouri  early  adopted  this  policy,  and  with  such  practical 
result  as  gave  The  Republican  many  arguments  whieh  it  was 
difficult  if  not  impossible  to  answer. 

Other  Democratic  journals  also  advocated  the  New  Depart- 
ure. Thus  in  the  course  of  events  it  happened  that  months 
before  the  proper  time  to  inaugurate  the  Presidential  campaign 
of  1872,  there  were  large  numbers  of  persons  in  either  of  the 
existing  political  organizations  who  believed  in  the  wisdom 
and  the  necessity  of  a  new  party  for  the  accomplishment  of 
reforms  and  the  practical  establishment  of  principles  which 
neither  the  Democratic  nor  the  Republican  party  would  un- 
dertake. And  it  was  well  known  that  among  the  best  citizens 
of  the  South  many  held  similar  opinions. 

Such,  in  brief,  was  the  situation  when  the  Cincinnati  Con- 
vention, the  first  national  assemblage  of  "Liberal  Repub- 
licans," was  held.  This  convention  was  brought  together  in 
the  mode  of  primitive  simplicity.  No  call  of  any  "  national 
committee  "  of  any  sort  had  been  issued.  The  Liberal  Repub- 
licans of  the  State  of  Missouri  had  published  an  invitation  to 
the  friends  of  political  reform  to  meet  at  Cincinnati,  for  the 
purpose  of  consultation,  of  the  interchange  of  views,  and  for 
such  action  as  they  might  think  the  interests  of  the  country 
demanded.  Long  before  the  time  designated  in  the  invitation 
— May  1,  1872, — it  became  evident  that  the  meeting  would  be 
largely  attended,  and  would  necessarily  develop  into  a  Na 
tional  Convention.  Indeed,  the  proposed  meeting  was  spoken 
of,  many  weeks  before  it  was  held,  as  the  coining  National 
Convention  of  the  Liberals,  and  formed  a  topic  of  constant 
conversation  in  political  circles  throughout  the  country  and  of 
daily  articles  in  the  public  press.  The  fear  began  to  be  enter- 


THE   CINCINNATI   CONVENTION.  537 

tained  by  many  reformers,  not  that  the  meeting  might  be  a 
mere  fiasco,  but  that  it  would  be  so  largely  attended  that  no 
power  could  keep  it  iti  order,  much  less  evoke  agreement, 
harmony  out  of  elements  acknowledged  to  be,  in  some  respects, 
diverse,  if  not  absolutely  conflicting. 

And  it  is,  perhaps,  true,  that  no  regular  national  convention 
of  any  political  party,  except  the  Chicago  Convention  of  1860, 
ever  brought  together  so  many  people  from  such  vast  expanse 
of  country,  as  the  modest  call  of  the  Missouri  Liberals  brought 
to  Cincinnati.  Nearly  every  State  and  Territory  in  the  Union 
was  represented,  while  Ohio,  Indiana,  Illinois,  Kentucky,  Penn 
sylvania,  and  New  York  were  each  represented  by  large  num- 
bers of  citizens.  The  hotels  of  Cincinnati  were  taxed  beyond 
their  utmost  capacity,  and  large  numbers  of  private  residences 
were  hospitably  opened  for  the  accommodation  of  strangers. 
A  Reunion  and  Reform  Convention,  over  which  Judge  Stallo 
presided,  was  held  at  the  same  time.  The  Democratic  State 
Convention  of  Kentucky  was  also  in  session  in  a  city  imme- 
diately opposite  Cincinnati.  But  without  these  accompanying 
meetings,  the  number  who  came  in  acceptance  of  the  Missouri 
invitation,  and  of  those  who  came  to  witness, the  proceedings, 
was  simply  prodigious.  Never  was  "the  Queen  City,"  as 
Cincinnati  has  been  often  designated,  so  crowded  on  the  occa- 
sion of  any  political  gathering. 

The  candidates  for  the  Presidential  nomination  were  Charles 
Francis  Adams,  of  Massachusetts,  B.  Gratz  Brown,  of  Mis- 
souri, David  Davis,  of  Illinois,  Horace  Greeley,  of  New  York, 
and  Lyman  Trumbull,  of  Illinois.  Ex-Governor  Curtin,  of 
Pennsylvania,  received  the  vote  of  his  State  on  the  n'rst  ballot, 
and  Chief  Justice  Chase  received  a  number  of  votes  at  dif- 
ferent times  during  the  ballotings. 

After  a  number  of  ballots,  during  which  Mr.  Adams  held  the 
lead,  a  movement  was  successfully  made  by  Mr.  Gratz  Brown, 
which  resulted  in  the  nomination  of  Mr.  Greeley.  Mr.  Brown 
was  chosen  as  the  candidate  for  Vice-President. 

A  long  and,  in  the  opinion  of  some,  strong  platform  was 
adopted,  the  main  force  of  which  lay  in  the  preamble,  which 
a  severe  arraignment  of  the  President  and  the  Republican 


538  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GREELUr. 

party.  This  portion  of  the  platform,  though  so  emphatically 
disapproved  by  the  nation  at  the  ensuing  election,  we  here  in- 
sert, that  our  readers  may  have  the  opportunity  to  judge  of  it 
for  themselves : 

The  administration  now  in  power  has  rendered  itself  guilty  of  wanton 
disregard  of  the  laws  of  the  land,  and  of  usurping  powers  not  granted  by 
the  Constitution ;  it  has  acted  as  if  the  laws  had  binding  force  only  for 
(hose  who  are  governed,  and  not  for  those  who  govern.  It  has  thus  struck 
a  blow  at  the  fundamental  principles  of  Constitutional  Government,  and 
the  liberties  of  the  citizen. 

The  President  of  the  United  States  has  openly  used  the  powers  and 
opportunities  of  his  high  office  for  the  promotion  of  personal  ends. 

He  has  kept  notoriously  corrupt  and  unworthy  men  in  places  of  power 
and  responsibility  to  the  detriment  of  the  public  interest. 

He  has  used  the  public  service  of  the  Government  as  a  machineiy  of 
corruption  and  personal  influence,  and  has  interfered,  with  tyrannical 
arrogance,  in  the  political  affairs  of  States  and  municipalities. 

He  has  rewarded  with  influential  and  lucrative  offices  men  wht  had 
acquired  his  favour  by  valuable  presents,  thus  stimulating  the  demoral- 
ization of  our  political  life  by  his  conspicuous  example. 

He  lias  shown  himself  deplorably  unequal  to  the  tasks  imposed  tipon 
him  by  the  necessities  of  the  country,  and  culpably  careless  of  the  respon- 
sibilities of  his  high  office. 

Tke  partisans  of  the  administration,  assuming  to  be  the  Republican 
party,  and  controlling  its  organization,  have  attempted  to  justify  such 
wrongs,  and  palliate  such  abuses,  to  the  end  of  maintaining  partisan 
ascendency. 

They  have  stood  in  the  way  of  necessary  investigations  and  indispensable 
reforms,  pretending  that  no  serious  fault  could  be  found  with  the  present 
administration  of  public  affairs,  thus  seeking  to  blind  the  eyes  of  the 
people. 

They  have  kept  alive  the  passions  and  resentments  of  the  late  civil  war, 
to  use  them  to  their  own  advantage;  they  have  resorted  to  arbitrary  meas- 
ures in  direct  conflict  with  the  organic  law,  instead  of  appealing  to  the 
better  instincts  of  the  Southern  people  by  restoring  to  them  those  rights 
the  enjoyment  of  which  is  so  indispensable  to  a  successful  administration 
of  their  local  affairs,  and  would  tend  to  revive  a  patriotic  and  hopeful 
national  feeling. 

They  have  degraded  themselves  and  the  name  of  tLeir  party,  once  justly 
entitled  to  the  confidence  of  the  nation,  by  a  base  sycophancy  to  the  dis- 
penser of  Executive  power  and  patronage,  unworthy  <>f  Republican  free- 
dom; they  have  sought  to  silence  the  voice  of  just  criticism  and  stifle  the 
moral  sense  of  the  people,  and  to  subjugate  public  opinion  by  tyrannical 
party  discipline. 

They  arc  striving  to  maintain  themselves  in  authority  for  selfish  end* 


POrULAK   RESPONSE   TO   NOMINATION.  539 

by  an  unscrupulous  use  of  the  power  which  rightfully  belongs  to  the 
people,  and  should  be  employed  only  in  the  service  of  the  country. 

Believing  that  an  organization  thus  led  and  controlled  can  no  longer  be 
of  service  to  the  best  interests  of  the  Republic,  we  have  resolved  to  make 
an  independent  appeal  to  the  sober  judgment,  conscience,  and  patriotism 
of  the  American  people. 

The  resolutions  were  in  the  usual  style  and  of  the  average 
value  of  similar  productions  of  National  Conventions,  and, 
having  failed  of  their  purpose,  do  not  claim  space  here. 

Mr.  Greeley's  nomination  was  greatly  unsatisfactory  to  not 
a  few  Liberal  Republicans,  whether  of  the  Convention  or  not. 
Politicians  and  journals  of  the  opposition  were  at  first  dis- 
posed to  treat  the  matter  as  little  better  than  a  joke.  They 
seemed  inclined  to  look  upon  Mr.  Greeley  as  he  had  been  too 
long  and  often  misrepresented,  not  as  God  and  his  own  studies 
and  labours  had  made  him.  They  set  up  a  false  Horace  Greeley, 
and  cast  gibes  at  him.  They  did  not  do  so  long.  Mr.  Thomas 
Nast  continued  to  make  the  cultivated  public  blush  at 'his 
humiliating  prostitution  of  genius  in  the  cartoons  of  Harper's 
Weekly  illustrated  newspaper;  but  the  politicians  of  the 
Republican  party  very  soon  perceived  that  Mr.  Greeley  was  a 
strong  candidate,  and  the  "  party  organs  "  were  not  long  in 
discovering  the  same  fact.  The  great  body  of  the  people  man- 
ifested respect  for  Mr.  Greeley's  genius  and  a  genuine  love  and 
admiration  of  his  character.  They  looked  through  the  mis- 
representations of  years,  and  saw  him  as  he  really  was,  —  a 
great,  good,  honest  man,  whose  foibles  did  not  amount  to  vices, 
whose  eccentricities  were  only  peccadillos  against  conventional 
trammels,  more  honoured  in  the  breach  than  the  observance. 

The  response  to  his  nomination  by  Southern  men  was  nota- 
bly enthusiastic.  The  venerable  Leslie  Coombes,  of  Kentucky, 
telegraphed  that  the  action  of  the  Convention  was  an  inspira- 
tion. Other  eminent  Southern  men  were  scarcely  less  emphatic 
in  their  expressions.  It  soon  became  apparent,  in  fine,  that 
Horace  Greeley  was  the  best  known  of  all  America's  public 
men  to  the  whole  people  and,  whether  a  majority  would  sup- 
port him  for  President  or  not,  he  occupied  a  high  position  in 
their  respect  and  a  warm  place  in  their  considerate  affections. 
Mr.  Greeley  had  not  been  nominated  a  fortnight  before  the 
managers  of  the  party  in  power  saw  that  thev  would  have  to 


540  LIFE  OF  HORACE   GREELEY. 

use  every  possible  means  of  political  influence  in  order  to 
defeat  him;  that  every  exertion  would  have  to  be  made  or  he 
would  be  borne  into  office  upon  a  tidal  wave  of  popular  appro- 
val created  by  Reform  principles  and  his  own  great  personal 
strength  with  the  people.  Every  exertion  was  made  by  those 
opposed  to  him  to  destroy  his  wide  and  growing  popularity 
A  number  of  men  were  put  to  work  by  the  national  executive 
committee  of  the  Republicans  examining  the  files  of  The 
Tribune  from  its  establishment  to  procure  for  publication 
every  sentence  ever  printed  in  the  editorial  columns  of  that 
journal,  whether  written  by  Mr.  Greeley  or  not,  that  might 
injure  him  with  the  people.  Great  banking-houses,  with  vast 
sums  of  money,  were  enlisted  to  fight  the  campaign  against 
him,  before  his  competitor  had  been  nominated.  Influences  of 
all  kinds,  in  fine,  ever  used  in  political  management  were  at 
once  set  in  motion  against  him. 

Mr.  Greeley  himself  calmly*  felt  the  popular  pulse.  Think- 
ing, and  having  every  reason  to  think,  from  the  manifest  signs 
of  the  times,  that  the  movement  of  which  he  had  been  made  the 
most  prominent  representative  man,  was  not  a  mere  partizan 
&meute^  but  a  beneficent  political  revolution,  he  accepted  the 
nomination  of  the  Cincinnati  Convention  in  a  letter  which 
may  long  be  read  with  profit  by  his  countrymen: 

NEW-YORK,  May  20, 1872. 

GEKTLEMEN: — I  have  chosen  not  to  acknowledge  your  letter  of  the  3d 
inst.  until  I  could  learn  how  the  work  of  your  Convention  was  received  in 
all  jparts  of  our  great  country,  and  judge  whether  that  work  was  approved 
and  ratified  by  the  mass  of  our  fellow-citizens.  Their  response  has  from 
day  to  day  reached  me  through  telegrams,  letters,  and  the  comments  of 
journalists  independent  of  official  patronage,  and  indifferent  to  the  smiles 
or  frowns  of  power.  The  number  and  character  of  these  unconstrained, 
unpurchased,  unsolicited  utterances,  satisfy  me  that  the  movement  which 
found  expression  at  Cincinnati  has  received  the  stamp  of  public  approval, 
and  been  hailed  by  a  majority  of  our  countrymen  as  the  harbinger  of  a 
better  day  for  the  Republic. 

I  do  not  misinterpret  this  approval  as  especially  complimentary  to  myself, 
•  nor  even  to  the  chivalrous  and  justly-esteemed  gentleman  with  whose 
name  I  thank  your  Convention  for  associating  mine.  I  receive  and  wel- 
come it  as  a  spontaneous  and  deserved  tribute  to  that  admirable  platform 
of  principles  wherein  your  Convention  so  tersely,  so  lucidly,  so  forcibly, 


ME.  GREELEY'S  LETTER  CF  ACCEPTANCE.  541 

set  forth  the  convictions  which  impelled,  and  the  purposes  which  guided, 
its  course,  —  a  platform  which,  casting  behind  it  the  wreck  and  rubbish  of 
worn-out  contentions  and  by-gone  feuds,  embodies  in  fit  and  few  words  the 
needs  and  aspirations  of  to-day.  Though  thousands  stand  ready  to  con- 
demn your  every  act,  hardly  a  syllable  of  criticism  or  cavil  has  been  aimed 
at  your  platform,  of  which  the  substance  may  be  fairly  epitomized  as 
follows : 

"First  —  All  the  political  rights  and  franchises  which  have  been  acquired  through  our 
late  bloody  convulsion  must  and  shall  be  guaranteed,  maintained,  enjoyed,  respected, 
evermore. 

"Second — All  the  political  rights  and  franchises  which  have  been  lost  through  that 
convulsion  should  and  must  be  promptly  restored  and  re-established,  so  that  there  shall 
be  henceforth  no  proscribed  class  and  no  disfranchised  caste  within  the  limits  of  our 
Union,  whose  long-estranged  people  shall  reunite  and  fraternize  upon  the  broad  basis  61 
universal  amnesty  with  impartial  suffrage. 

"  Third — That,  subject  to  our  solemn  constitutional  obligation  to  maintain  the  equal 
rights  of  all  citizens,  our  policy  should  aim  at  local  self-government,  and  not  at  central- 
ization; that  the  civil  authority  should  be  supreme  over  the  military;  that  the  writ  of 
habeas  corpus  should  be  jealously  upheld  as  the  safeguard  of  personal  freedom;  that  the 
individual  citizen  should  enjoy  the  largest  liberty  consistent  with  public  order,  and  that 
there  shall  be  no  Federal  subversion  of  the  internal  polity  of  the  several  States  and  muni- 
cipalities, but  that  each  shall  be  left  free  to  enforce  the  rights  and  promote  the  well- 
being  of  its  inhabitants  by  such  means  as  the  judgment  of  its  own  people  shall  pre- 
scribe. 

"fourth  —  There  shall  be  a  real  and  not  merely  a  simulated  reform  in  the  civil  service 
of  the  Republic,  to  which  end  it  is  indispensable  that  the  chief  dispenser  of  its  vast 
official  patronage  shall  be  shielded  from  the  main  temptation  to  use  his  power  selfishly 
by  a  rule  inexorably  forbidding  and  precluding  his  re-election. 

"Fifth — That  the  raising  of  revenue,  whether  by  tariff  or  otherwise,  shall  be  recog- 
nized and  treated  as  the  people's  immediate  business,  to  be  shaped  and  directed  by  them 
through  their  representatives  in  Congress,  whose  action  thereon  the  President  must 
neither  overrule  by  his  veto,  attempt  to  dictate,  nor  presume  to  punish  by  bestowing 
office  only  on  those  who  agree  with  him,  or  withdrawing  it  from  those  who  do  not. 

"Sixth — That  the  public  lands  must  be  sacredly  reserved  for  occupation  and  acquisi- 
tion by  cultivators,  and  not  recklessly  squandered  on  the  projectors  of  railroads  for  which 
our  people  have  no  present  need,  and  the  premature  construction  of  which  is  annually 
plunging  us  into  deeper  and  deeper  abysses  of  foreign  indebtedness. 

"Seventh — That  the  achievement  of  these  grand  purposes  of  universal  beneficence  is 
expected  and  sought  at  the  hands  of  all  who  approve  them,  irrespective  of  past  affilia- 
tions. 

"Eighth—  That  the  public  faith  must,  at  all  hazards,  be  maintained,  and  the  national 
credit  preserved. 

"  Ninth  —  That  the  patriotic  devotedness  and  inestimable  services  of  our  fellow-citizens, 
who,  as  soldiers  or  sailors,  upheld  the  flag  and  maintained  the  unity  of  the  Republic, 
shall  ever  be  gratefully  remembered  and  honourably  requited." 

These  propositions,  so  ably  and  forcibly  presented  in  the  platform  of 
yrur  Convention,  have  already  fixed  the  attention  and  commanded  the 
assent  of  a  large  majority  of  our  countrymen,  who  joyfully  adopt  them, 
as  I  do,  as  the  basis  of  a  true,  beneficent  national  reconstruction ;  of  a  new 
departure  from  jealousies,  strifes,  and  hates,  which  have  no  longer  ade- 
quate motive  or  even  plausible  pretext,  into  an  atmosphere  of  peace, 
fraternity,  and  mutual  good-will.  In  vain  do  the  drill-sergeants  of  decay, 
ing  organizations  flourish  menacingly  their  truncheons,  and  angrily  insist 


542  LIFE   OF   I10KACE   GREELEY. 

that  the  files  shall  be  closed  and  straightened.  In  vain  do  the  whippers-in 
of  parties  once  vital,  because  rooted  in  the  vital  needs  of  the  hour,  protest 
against  straying  and  bolting,  denounce  men  nowise  their  inferiors  as 
traitors  and  renegades,  and  threaten  them  with  infamy  and  ruin.  I  am 
confident  that  the  American  people  have  already  made  your  cause  their 
own,  fully  resolved  that  their  brave  hearts  and  strong  arms  shall  bear  it 
on  to  triumph.  In  this  faith,  and  with  the  distinct  understanding,  that,  if 
elected,  I  shall  be  the  President,  not  of  a  party,  but  of  the  whole  people, 
I  accept  your  nomination  in  the  confident  trust  that  the  masses  of  our 
countrymen  North  and  South  are  eager  to  clasp  hands  across  the  bloody 
chasm  which  has  too  long  divided  them,  forgetting  that  they  have  been 
enemies  in  the  joyful  consciousness  that  they  are,  and  must  henceforth 
remain,  brethren.  Yours  gratefully, 

HORACE  GREELEY. 

To  Hon  CARL  SCHTTRZ,  President;  Hon.  GEORGE  W.  JULIAN,  Vice-Presi- 
dent; and  Messrs.  WM.  E.  MCLEAN,  JOHN  G.  DAVIDSON,  J.  H.  RHODES, 
Secretaries,  of  the  National  Convention  of  the  Liberal  Republicans  of 
the  United  States. 

The  next  great  practical  question  to  be  decided  in  the  cam- 
paign was,  whether  the  Democratic  party,  by  authoritative 
action,  would  actually  proceed  upon  the  New  Departure;  would 
approve  the  principles  and  endorse  the  nominations  of  the 
Cincinnati  Convention.  Mr.  Greeley,  before  the  publication 
of  the  foregoing  letter,  had  developed  so  great  popular 
strength,  that  very  many  influential  Democrats  and  influential 
Democratic  journals,  had  advocated  his  nomination  by  the 
Democracy.  Two  able  journals  held  out  against  him — The 
New- York  World  and  The  Chicago  Times.  Among  influential 
men  in  the  Democratic  party  I  only  think  of  two  who  made 
active  and  powerful  opposition  to  the  acceptance  of  Mr.  Gree- 
ley's  candidacy.  These  were  the  Hon.  Thomas  F.  Bayard,  of 
Delaware,  and  the  Hen.  Daniel  W.  Voorhees,  of  Indiana.  Of 
these,  Mr.  Voorhees  was  the  more  vehement,  perhaps.  He 
made  no  disguise  whatever  of  his  feelings,  proclaiming  them 
openly,  and  with  his  accustomed  strength  and  eloquence  of 
speech,  in  the  House  of  Representatives.  But  notwithstanding 
these  opposing  influences,  there  was  a  strong  and  general  feeling 
in  the  Democratic  party  in  favour  of  Mr.  Greeley. 

This  found  ample  demonstration  at  the  National  Convention 
of  the  year  which  was  held  in  tho  city  of  Baltimore  on  the  9th 
of  July,  where  Grceley  and  Brown  were  adopted  as  Democratic 


THE   PHILADELPHIA    CONVENTION.  543 

candidates.  Mr.  Greeley  accepted  this  nomination  in  a  long 
letter  dated  July  18. 

Thus  joyously  and  in  the  pleasant  ways  of  peace,  was  the 
Horace  Greeley  Presidential  campaign  inaugurated. 

Meantime,  the  canvass  had  been  actively  set  in  motion  by 
the  Republicans.  Their  National  Convention  assembled  in 
the  city  of  Philadelphia,  June  5th,  and  was  largely  attended. 
The  nomination  of  Mr.  Greeley  at  Cincinnati  had  been  fol- 
lowed by  such  palpable  evidences  of  his  great  popularity,  that 
the  wisest  Republicans  saw,  as  has  been  observed,  that  they 
must  use  every  influence  in  their  power  to  stop  the  tide  so 
strongly  running  in  his  favour,  before  its  force  and  volume 
should  become  perfectly  irresistible.  One  of  the  first  things 
they  determined  upon,  was  to  make  their  National  Convention 
a  great  and  impressive  gathering.  And  in  this  they  succeeded. 
The  city  was  handsomely  decorated  with  flags  and  banners,  the 
"  outside  attendance  "  was  very  large,  all  the  usual  appliances 
of  great  gatherings  were  abundantly  supplied.  In  the  mem- 
bership of  the  Convention  itself  were  many  public  men  of 
general  reputation:  governors  and  ex-governors  of  States; 
members  of  either  House  of  Congress  and  those  who  had  been; 
not  a  few  who  had  been  prominent  officers  in  the  Union  army 
during  the  war;  a  number  of  gentlemen  of  the  highest  stand- 
ing in  trade  and  commerce.  In  campaign  language  it  was 
called  "The  Office-Holders'  Convention;"  and  it  is  certain 
there  were  many  office-holders  among  the  delegates,  but  not 
more,  I  think,  than  is  usually  the  case  in  national  conventions 
of  the  political  party  in  possession  of  the  government.  If  we 
consider  the  character  of  a  large  proportion  of  the  members, 
the  services  they  had  done  the  state,  whether  in  council  or  in 
war,  wre  shall  agree  that  the  Republican  Convention  of  1872 
was,  as  to  its  personnel,  greatly  entitled  to  the  respect  of 
candid  men. 

President  Grant  was  renominated  by  acclamation,  and  Senator 
Henry  Wilson,  of  Massachusetts,  was  chosen  for  the  Vice-Presi- 
dency. The  unanimity  and  enthusiasm  displayed  throughout 
this  Convention  were  almost  wonderful,  and  were  more  than 
straws  to  indicate  the  approaching  verdict  of  the  people.  The 


644  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GREELET. 

real  platform  of  the  Republicans  in  this  canvass  was  the  history 
of  the  Republican  party  from  1861  to  1868. 

The  most  important  portions  of  the  proceedings  in  their 
effect  upon  the  campaign  were  speeches.  Whilst  the  Conven- 
tion was  waiting  for  the  report  of  the  Committee  on  Resolu- 
tions, speeches  were  made  by  Senator  John  A.  Logan,  Gerrit 
Smith,  and  Senator  Morton.  Mr.  Logan  appears  to  have  been 
entirely  unprepared,  and  his  speech  was  inferior  to  what  he 
has  the  ability  to  make,  and  has  frequently  made,  before  and 
during  and  since  the  memorable  campaign  of  1872.  But 
Mr.  Gerrit  Smith  made  just  such  an  address  as  was  best  calcu- 
lated to  prevent  Republicans  from  going  over  to  the  Liberals. 
As  for  Mr.  Morton,  he  then  and  there,  and  in  a  very  few 
minutes,  delivered  a  speech  which  was  the  Republican  inspira- 
tion of  the  campaign.  It  was  the  real  platform  of  the  party, 
as  above  described,  in  condensation.  And. for  the  whole 
canvass,  it  supplied  the  orators  and  writers  of  the  administra- 
tion party  with  better  and  stronger  arguments  than  they  were 
able  to  gather  from  all  other  sources.  Mr.  Gerrit  Smith  gave 
the  Republicans  heart,  and  Mr.  Morton  gave  them  brains. 

The  campaign  was  one  of  great  animation.  With  very  few 
exceptions  all  who  were  able  to  do  so  made  speeches  in  behalf 
ot  the  party  whose  cause  they  espoused.  A  few  prominent 
Democrats  declined  to  support  Mr.  Greeley,  but  he  waa 
powerfully  sustained  by  the  distinguished  Liberal  Senators  of 
whom  I  have  already  spoken,  by  General  N.  P.  Banks,  of 
Massachusetts,  Hon.  Austin  Blair,  of  Michigan,  Ex-Governor 
Pierrepont,  of  West  Virginia,  Governor  Palmer,  of  Illinois, 
and  very  many  others  who  had  long  been  scarcely  less  eminent 
and  influential  Republicans  than  these.  He  could  hardly  have 
been  more  heartily  sustained  than  he  was  by  most  Democrats 
had  he  been  a  Democrat  all  his  life.  This  was  specially 
observable  in  Pennsylvania  and  Indiana  where  Governors  were 
to  be  chosen  at  the  State  elections  in  October.  In  Pennsyl- 
vania ex-Senator  "Buckalew  was  the  candidate;  in  Indiana,  ex- 
Senator  Hendricks.  They  spoke  and  laboured  for  Mr.  Greeley 
as  earnestly  and  constantly  as  for  their  own  State  tickets. 
There  was,  indeed,  what  was  called  a  straight  Democratic 


THE  CANVASS.  545 

Convention  held  at  Louisville  early  in  September,  which 
nominated  Mr.  Charles  O'Connor,  of  New  York,  for  the 
Presidency.  Those  who  supported  this  ticket  were  called 
"  Bourbons,"  but  they  were  far  from  formidable  in  numbers. 
As  a  rule  the  action  of  the  representative  men  of  the  party  at 
the  Baltimore  convention  was  sustained  by  leading  men  and  the 
general  Democratic  body  politic. 

After  his  return,  Mr.  Greeley  visited  Baltimore,  and  deliv- 
ered a  number  of  agricultural  and  political  addresses  at  dif- 
ferent places,  but  he  had  only  been  at  home  about  a  fortnight 
when  Mrs.  Greeley,  who  had  long  been  an  invalid,  was  taken 
suddenly  and  alarmingly  ill.  Devoting  his  entire  attention  to 
her,  watching  by  her  bedside  almost  constantly,  both  day  and 
night,  he  was  compelled,  of  course,  to  decline  all  calls  for  his 
appearance  in  public,  or  even  to  see  his  friends.  Mrs.  Greeley 
expired  on  the  morning  of  October  30th,  at  the  house  of  Mr. 
Greeley's  friend,  Mr.  Alvin  J.  Johnson,  in  the  city.  Two  days 
afterwards  her  remains  were  taken  to  Greenwood,  the  funeral 
ceremonies  having  been  performed  at  Mr.  Chapin's  church. 
By  the  death  of  his  wife  Mr.  Greeley  was  inexpressibly 
afflicted. 

He  had  not  seemed  to  be  greatly  discouraged  by  the  October 
elections.  Pennsylvania  and  Ohio  had  gone  against  his  friends, 
but  by  small  majorities,  while  Mr.  Hendricks  had  been  elected 
in  Indiana.  Notwithstanding  such  result,  he  yet  expressed 
hopes  of  the  triumph  of  Reform,  and  appeared  constantly 
cheerful  to  all  his  friends.  Perhaps  this  cheerfulness  was 
assumed,  as  a  duty  to  the  cause  he  represented.  It  is  probable 
that  such  is  the  fact.  It  was  a  prompting  of  his  great  nature 
that  he  should  show  no  personal  disappointment  in  defeat. 
The  October  elections  clearly  indicated,  however,  the  defeat  of 
the  Reform  party  in  the  quickly  following  November  election. 
Of  the  thirty-seven  States,  President  Grant  carried  thirty-one. 

Soon  after  the  election,  Caleb  Lyon,  of  Lyonsdale,  poet  and 
politician,  met  Mr.  Greeley  on  Broadway,  and,  after  the  usual 
salutations,  said,  "  Well,  Mr.  Greeley,  how  do  you  yourself 
account  for  the  result  of  the  election?" 

"Let  us  go  get  a  lunch,"  said  Mr.  Greeley,  "and  I  will  tell 

35 


MG  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

They  went  together  to  a*  restaurant  near  by,  and,  having 
ordered  lunch,  Mr.  Greeley  said:  "Well,  Governor,  I  will  tell 
you  how  I  came  to  be  defeated.  The  facts  are  plain.  I  was  an 
abolitionist  for  years,  when  it  was  as  much  as  one's  life  was 
worth  even  here  in  New- York,  to  be  an  abolitionist;  and  the 
negroes  have  all  voted  against  me.  Whatever  of  talents  and 
energy  I  have  possessed  I  have  freely  contributed  all  my  life 
long  to  Protection;  to  the  cause  of  our  manufactures.  And 
the  manufacturers  have  expended  millions  to  defeat  me.  I 
even  made  myself  ridiculous  in  the  opinion  of  many  whose 
good  wishes  I  desired  by  showing  fair  play  and  giving  a  fair 
lield  in  The  Tribune  to  'Woman's  Eights;'  and  the  women 
have  all  gone  against  me  !" 

During  a  call  which  Governor  Lyon  made  upon  Senator 
Sumner  early  in  1873,  one  of  the  most  noted  of  the  advocates 
of  Woman's  Rights  also  called,  when  the  Governor  related  to 
her  this  incident.  It  was  replied  to  in  a  spirit  of  heartless 
insolence  altogether  beyond  the  capacity  of  a  gentleman. 

The  main  causes  of  Mr.  Greeley's  defeat  may,  perhaps,  be 
found  in  the  strength  of  party  associations;  the  consolidation 
of  the  money  power  against  him;  the  defection  of  many  free- 
traders among  Republicans;  the  refusal  of  many  Democrats  to 
sustain  him  notwithstanding  the  admirable  action  of  their 
Convention ;  the  immense  patronage  of  the  government,  freely 
used  in  the  interest  of  President  Grant.  The  latter  received  a 
less  number  of  votes  in  several  States  than  he  had  received 
four  years  before.  Had  the  election  occurred  in  July,  or  the 
early  part  of  August,  Mr.  Greeley  would  probably  have  been 
elected.  The  greatness  of  his  popularity  had  by  this  time 
become  so  manifest,  that  Republican  managers  saw  that  every 
possible  means  must  be  used  to  avert  discomfiture.  Their 
desperation  gave  them  a  temporary  strength  which  secured  a 
victory,  but  then  only  upon  solemn  pledges  on  the  part  of  their 
representative  men  and  journals  in  behalf  of  the  reforms  de- 
manded by  Mr.  Greeley. 

In  the  moment  of  defeat,  there  were  those  who  said  that  if 
Mr.  Adams,  or  Mr.  Trumbull,  or  Judge  Davis,  had  been 
nominated,  he  would  have  beaten  President  Grant.  This 


AT    WORK.    ON    THE    TRIBUNE. 


547 


opinion  was  probably  incorrect.  Mr.  Adams  or  Mr.  Tmmbull 
would  have  divided  the  support  of  the  money  power  with 
President  Grant;  Judge  Davis  would  have  received  more 
Democratic  votes  than  Mr.  Greelcy;  but  it  may  reasonably  be 
claimed  that  neither  could  have  secured  as  great  a  popular 
endorsement  as  the  chosen  candidate.  Certainly  not  one  of 
those  eminent  gentlemen  could  have  done  himself  more  honour 
or  by  his  own  labours  given  the  liberal  cause  more  strength 
during  the  canvass  than  did  Horace  Greeley. 

The  election  over,  Mr.  Greeley  returned  to  his  old  editorial 
room  and  cheerfully  resumed  work  upon  The  Tribune  with  his 
accustomed  vigour  and  versatility.  It  appeared  as  though  he 
had  many  years  of  strong  life  before  him ;  years  in  which,  in 
this  unpretending  sanctum,  he  could  accomplish  more  for  his 
country  and  mankind  than  might  have  been  possible,  had  he 
been  transferred  to  the  Executive  Mansion  and  lived  to 
occupy  it. 


JOHN    W.   FORNEY.— Seepage  534. 


CHAPTEE   XXX. 

LAST  ILLNESS,  DEATH,  AND  FUNERAL. 

111.  Greeley  Suddenly  Prostrated  by  Alarming  Illness — The  Public  Inter- 
est  in  the  State  of  His  Ailment  —  His  Death  from  Disease  of  the  Brain 
— Circumstances  Attending  his  Last  Hours — The  Causes  of  his  Death 
Manifold  —  Work,  the  Criterion  of  Age  —  His  Funeral — Attended  by 
the  President  and  Members  of  the  Cabinet,  the  Yice-President,  and 
Many  Eminent  Men — Funeral  Sermons  by  Mr.  Chapin  and  Henry 
Ward  Beecher — The  Procession  to  the  Grave — A  City  in  Mourning — 
Requiescat. 

MR.  CTREELEY  wrote,  however,  for  The  Tribune  only  a  short 
time  after  the  election.  His  constant  nursing,  night  and  day, 
of  Mrs.  Greeley,  immediately  following  a  long  period  of  great 
intellectual  labour,  accompanied  by  the  wearing  physical 
fatigue  of  travel,  produced  an  ailment  of  the  brain,'  the  first 
manifestation  of  which  was  a  distressing  sleeplessness.  He 
rapidly  became  worse,  and  the  country,  before  it  had  recovered 
from  the  excitement  of  the  political  campaign  in  which  he 
had  borne  the  most  prominent  part,  was  shocked  by  the  intel- 
ligence that  he  was  prostrated  by  alarming  illness  which  might 
at  any  moment  prove  fatal. 

Sleeplessness  was  followed  by  inflammation  of  the  brain, 
which  would  yield  to  no  medical  treatment,  but  rapidly  grow- 
ing worse,  soon  produced  delirium.  Mr.  Greeley 's- condition 
was  telegraphed  over  the  country  daily  by  the  Associated 
Press,  and  many  special  correspondents  were  instructed  to 
particularly  inquire  and  report  upon  the  subject.  The  public 
interest  in  his  situation  was  universal.  It  was  manifested 
among  all  classes  of  men,  in  all  walks  of  life.  For  several 
days  Mr.  Greeley  suffered  greatly,  and  his  disease  was  fre- 
quently manifested  in  the  most  painful  manner.  The  delirium 
resulting  from  the  inflammation  of  the  organ  assailed  was 
excessive,  as  is  always  the  case  in  such  disease  with  large  and 

(548) 


HIS   DEATH.  549 

active  brains.  Their  capacity  of  disease,  of  delirium,  appears 
to  be  proportionate  to  their  capacity  of  labour.  So  it  was  with 
Mr.  Greeley's  cotemporary,  Dr.  Charles  H.  Ray,  of  Chicago, 
who  died  of  inflammation  of  the  brain  only  about  two  years 
before  Mr.  Greeley,  and  with  similar  painful  and  extraordinary 
manifestations  of  delirium. 

The  sick  man  had  every  attention  which  medical  skill,  the 
most  unselfish  friendship,  the  devoted  love  of  daughters  could 
supply.  But  skill,  friendship,  love  availed  not  to  resist  the 
approach  of  the  king  of  terrors.  After  some  hours  of  calm 
and  serene  rest,  with  his  faculties  restored  to  their  natural 
power  and  clearness,  he  said,  "I  know  that  my  Redeemer 
liveth,"  and  his  soul  peacefully  left  its  earthly  tenement  on 
Friday,  November  29th. 

His  death  was  like  his  life.  The  wild  strife  of  his  own  dis- 
ordered faculties  raged  like  the  conflicts  of  his  long  career, 
continuing  his  almost  fierce  unrest.  He  was  assailed  by  mobs; 
he  was  encompassed  by  relentless  enemies;  he  was  misrepre- 
sented and  maligned  by  his  own  countrymen  whom  he  was 
faithfully  labouring  to  serve.  In  the  wild  tumult  of  his  dis- 
ease, years  were  crowded  into  moments,  with  the  effect  of  the 
most  grotesque  delirium.  But  he  passed  triumphantly  even 
through  this  awful  ordeal.  Before  the  final  effort  of  his  mind 
the  storms  which  threatened  to  engulf  it  passed  away,  so  that, 
as  was  most  befitting  to  his  life  and  character,  calmly,  and 
with  mind  unclouded,  Horace  Greeley  sought  the  bosom  of 
his  Father  and  his  God. 

The  causes  of  Mr.  Greeley's  death  were  manifold.  Those 
who  suppose  that  personal  disappointment  at  the  result  of  the 
election  had  much  to  do  with  it,  palpably  err.  "Whether  he 
were  elected  or  whether  he  were  defeated  probably  made  less 
difference  to  him  than  to  almost  any  of  his  supporters.  He 
constantly  regarded  himself  as  nothing,  the  cause  as  every- 
thing. Whatsoever  there  was,  therefore,  of  disappointment, 
whatsoever  there  was  in  the  election  that  brought  grief  to  him, 
did  not  belong  to  disappointed  ambition,  but  to  his  earnest, 
profound  concern  for  the  welfare  of  the  people  and  the  peace 
and  prosperity  of  his  country. 


550  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

One  of  the  last  letters  he  ever  wrote, — perhaps  the  very 
last, — was  as  follows: 

NEW-YORK,  November  10,  1872. 

DEAR  Sin:  —  I  have  yours  of  the  Gth  inst.  My  misfortunes  do  not 
"come  single  files  but  in  battalions."  I  grieve  that  you  are  also  a  sufferer 
by  our  disastrous  canvass.  I  cannot  say  that  I  see  any  light  ahead. 

Yours,  sadly,  HORACE  GREELEY. 

C.  A.  HAVILAND,  Esq.,  Chicago,  Illinois. 

That  he  could  see  no  light  ahead  for  his  country's  thorough 
pacification,  and  the  purification  of  its  government  filled  him 
with  a  profound  and  poignant  sorrow,  no  doubt.  The  same 
sorrow  would  have  agitated  him  in  the  same  degree,  had  Mr. 
Adams,  or  Mr.  Trumbull,  or  Judge  Davis  been  the  defeated 
candidate  instead  of  himself.  If  there  were  in  his  sadness  a 
personal  sorrow,  it  was  that  the  coloured  people,  for  whom  he 
had  done  and  dared  so  much,  had  utterly  failed  to  recognize 
his  labours  in  their  behalf;  that  the  people,  generally,  of  whom 
he  was  so  true  a  representative  man,  had  failed  to  stand  at 
once  by  themselves  and  the  Republic's  good.  And  if  this 
were  so,  it  was  the  sorrow,  not  of  a  disappointed  man,  but  of  a 
philanthropist  and  patriot.  The  deeper  such  sorrow  was,  the 
more  honourable  was  it  to  his  character.  And  if  such  was 
one  of  the  causes  of  his  death,  let  it  nevermore  be  said  that  he 
did  not  die  for  his  country  as  truly  and  greatly  as  he  had 
lived  for  it. 

Mr.  Greeley,  during  the  canvass,  had  been  compelled,  by 
circumstances,  to  submit  to  over-work.  From  this  he  would 
have  speedily  recuperated,  perhaps,  if  he  could  have  had 
subsequent  rest.  This,  the  illness  of  his  wife,  and  his  devoted 
affection  for  her,  prevented.  Under  these,  and  more  strains 
upon  it,  his  physical  nature  gave  way. 

Nor  should  we  fail  to  conpider  that  work,  not  years,  is  the 
true  criterion  of  a  man's  age.  Judged  by  this  standard,  no 
one  ever  lived  longer  than  Horace  Greeley,  because  no  greater 
worker  ever  lived.  That  which  he  wrote,  and  which  exerted  less 
or  more  influence  upon  his  countrymen  and  mankind,  would,  if 
printed  in  volumes  like  Bancroft's  History  of  the  United  States, 
make  a  large  library.  His  extemporaneous  political  addresses 


THE   BODY   LYING   IN   STATE.  jf  1 

had  they  all  been  reported,  would  make  several  volume,  c^i'i 
every  one  would  coutain  much  of  originality  and  many 
reflections  of  permanent  value.  His  addresses  before  agricul- 
tural societies,  clubs  of  different  kinds,  would  make  several 
more  volumes.  IBefore  the  immense  quantity  of  Horace  G:ree- 
ley's  writings  of  permanent  value,  even  the  long  unparalleled 
works  of  Lope  de  Vega  pale  their  ineffectual  fires.  Counting 
his  years  by  work,  Mr.  Greeley  lived  much  longer  than 
Methuselah.  Though  the  causes  of  his  death  were,  as  we  have 
seen,  manifold,  he  died,  therefore,  of  old  age.  The  machinery 
by  which  his  mind  worked  had  become  worn  out  through 
great  and  constant  use. 

The  body  of  Mr.  Greeley  was  conveyed  to  the  City  Hall 
where  it  lay  in  state  in  the  Governor's  Eoom.  The  remains 
were  visited  by  many  thousand  persons;  by  newsboys  in  large 
numbers,  who  for  once  put  aside  their  forwardness  and  wept 
at  sight  of  all  that  was  left  of  one  they  knew  had  been  their 
friend;  by  workingmen  of  every  trade;  by  the  most  eminent 
of  the  citizens  of  New- York.  The  lowest  and  the  highest  and 
all  intervening  classes  paid  deferential  respect  to  the  remains 
of  him  who  had  been  the  friend  of  all  mankind.  A  thousand 
instances  of  touching  affection  were  given  by  those  who  had 
never  personally  known  Mr.  Greeley.  Those  who  had  known 
him  in  life  did  not  attempt  to  conceal  their  ungovernable 
emotions  of  sorrow. 

From  the  City  Hall,  Mr.  Greeley's  body  was  removed  to  the 
residence  of  Mr.  Samuel  Sinclair,  publisher  of  The  Tribune, 
who  was  one  of  the  family  mourners.  And  still  the  affections 
of  the  people  continued  to  be  manifested.  Hundreds  upon 
hundreds  brought  flowers  to  rest  upon  the  coffin;  large  num- 
bers continued  to  come  to  look  for  the  last  time  upon  the  face 
of  the  great  journalist.  Mr.  Sinclair's  house  was  not  large 
enough  to  contain  the  flowers  which  affection  brought  to  place 
•ipon  the  bier  of  Horace  Greeley. 

The  funeral  took  place  upon  Wednesday,  December  4th. 
Before  ten  o'clock,  the  friends  and  associates  of  the  late  Editor 
began  to  gather  at  Mr.  Sinclair's  residence,  on  "West  Forty- 
fifth  street.  Thence  the  body  was  removed  to  the  church  of 


352  UFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

tiie  Divine  Paternity  (that  of  Reverend  E.  H.  Chapin,  D.  D.), 
where  the  funeral  ceremonies  were  performed,  and  whence  the 
procession  moved  to  the  cemetery.  The  pall-bearers  took 
charge  of  the  remains  at  Mr.  Sinclair's  house.  These  were: 
Chief  Justice  Chase,  Mr.  "William  M.  Evarts,  Senators  Trum- 
bull  and  Fenton,  Mr.  Thurlow  Weed,  Mr.  John  E.  Williams, 
Mr.  Ivory  Chamberlin,  Mr.  Erastus  Brooks,  Rev.  Dr.  Bright, 
Mr.  Sinclair  Tousey,  Mr.  William  Orton,  Mr.  R  M.  Hoe,  Mr. 
D.  W.  Bruce,  Mr.  P.  C.  Baker,  Mr.  Robert  Bonner,  Mr.  J.  G. 
Lightbody,  Mr.  Dudley  S.  Gregory,  Mr.  Charles  S.  Storrs,  Mr. 
A.  J.  Johnson,  and  Mr.  John  R  Stuart  Following  these  were 
the  family  and  particular  friends,  and  next  the  newspapei  fra- 
ternity, very  largely  represented.  All  the  employes  of  the 
different  departments  of  The  Tribune  in  the  city  were  present, 
with  large  numbers  from  other  journals  and  press  associations. 

Dr.  Chapin's  church  would  not  contain  a  tithe  of  the  persons 
who  desired  admission.  As  the  coffin  was  carried  up  the  aisle 
and  deposited  in  front  of  the  pulpit,  a  solemn  voluntary 
pealed  from  the  organ,  and  the  people  who  for  an  hour  had 
filled  every  inch  of  space  except  the  reserved  seats,  reverently 
rose  to  their  feet.  Upon  the  south  of  the  pulpit  was  the 
President  of  the  United  States.  Near  by  were  the  Vice-Presi- 
dent and  the  Vice-President-elect.  The  Secretary  of  War  sat 
near  the  President's  right,  and  near  him  was  the  Honourable 
Elihu  B.  Washburne,  Minister  to  France,  at  this  time  visiting 
the  United  States.  Senator  Conkling,  Governor  Hoffman  and 
staff,  the  Governors  of  New  Jersey  and  Connecticut,  Mayor 
Hall,  ot  Xew-York,  and  the  mayors  of  several  neighbouring 
cities  formed  part  of  the  remarkable  assemblage. 

During  his  last  illness,  Mr.  Greeley  had  spoken  with  great 
admiration  and  kindness  of  two  remarkable  women  he  had 
known — Margaret  Fuller,  and  Clara  Louise  Kellogg.  Suddenly 
the  stillnees  which  had  followed  the  mournful  music  of  the 
organ  was  lovingly  disturbed  by  a  sweet,  ringing  voice,  singing 
with  indescribable  beauty  and  power  and  tendernes  "  I  Know 
that  my  Redeemer  Liveth."  Every  eye  moistened  and  every 
heart  beat  quick  at  this  touching  exhibition  of  Miss  Kellogg'? 
affectionate  offering  to  her  great  friend,  there  lying  dead. 


THE  FUNERAL.  5t3 

During  the  funeral,  the  cities  cf  -s'ew-Ycik  c-Txd  Brorkly--. 
stopped  all  business.  "The  whole  top^a-e  pjured  lortli,' 
says  The  Tribune's  report,  "to  watch  ihe  sclemn  cortege  a.ro 
testify  their  grief.  From  early  in  the  fcrer-con  until  the  lcx,j 
procession  had  passed  by,  the  entire  line  of  march,  from  For'ry- 
fifth  street  to  Greenwood  Cemetery,  was  crowded  with  spe  :'i>- 
tors.  It  was  not  merely  an  assemblage  of  sight-seers:  i:',  vns 
a  gathering  of  sympathizing  friends.  As  on  Tuesday,  e.ul 
faces  and  moist  eyes  everywhere  looked  out  from  the  dp  >.--t-. 
As  on  Tuesday,  the  labouring  men  and  women«and  hun;lier 
classes  generally  were  foremost  in  their  manifestations  and 
most  demonstrative  in  their  sorrow.  It  had  been  noticed  on 
Tuesday  that  among  the  visitors  to  the  Governor's  Room,  at 
the  City  Hall,  were  great  numbers  of  newsboys.  These  active 
little  members  of  society  were  plentiful  along  the  route  yester- 
day also,  and  for  once  their  shrill  cries  were  hushed  and  their 
spirits  were  quieted.  Horace  Greeley  had  always  been  one  of 
their  favourite  heroes.  They  used  to  call  out  to  him  familiarly 
in  the  streets,  and  many  of  them,  doubtless,  cherished  the 
expectation  of  getting  to  be  editors  some  day  themselves.  The 
coloured  people  were  likewise  numerous,  and  many  of  them 
seemed  deeply  affected.  Farmers  were  often  seen  among  the 
crowd.  '  Sir,'  said  a  sturdy  countryman  to  a  member  of  The 
Tribune  staff,  in  front  of  Mr.  Sinclair's  house,  before  the  cor 
tege  moved,  '  I  have  come  a  hundred  miles  to  be  at  the  funera. 
of  Horace  Greeley;  can't  you  possibly  get  me  in  to  have  one 
look  at  hinrl'  The  doors  had  -then  been  closed;  but  after  many 
repulses  the  man  got  in.  A  moment  later  he  came  out  with 
flushed  face  and  trembling  lip,  pulled  his  hat  down  over  his 
eyes,  and  hurried  away.  Forty-fifth  street,  between  Fifth  and 
Sixth  avenues,  was  occupied  by  a  great  multitude  of  people, 
while  the  Fifth  avenue,  above  and  below  the  church,  was  almost 
i  impassable,  long  before  the  hour  appointed  for  the  funeral. 
Just  opposite  the  church  is  a  row  of  unfinished  dwelling- 
houses.  These  were  occupied  by  a  throng  which  filled  all  the 
windows  and  covered  the  roof.  The  doorsteps  of  all  the  houses 
along  the  avenue,  without  exception,  were  thickly  crowded. 
windows  and  balconies  were  full;  hotels,  club-houses,  and 


554.  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

*?nb"i3  br'ld;ngs  }f  ail  \inds  presented  a  sea  of  human  faces. 
j^o  zi  c  could  aiift.ir'eritand  the  meaning  of  such  a  gathering. 
j/t  "WOF  greater  than  ihe  m altitude  which  welcomed  the  Grand 
T'?ike  Alexis,  or  watched  the  funeral  of  Abraham  Lincoln.  It 
has  nad  no  parallel  in  our  recent  history.  Yet  everybody 
that  as  a  spectacle  the  funeral  would  have  little  to  inter 
toe  mere  idle  spectator.  There  were  no  soldiers,  no  ban- 
fiags,  no  emblems,  no  bands  of  music,  no  gaudy  car 
•will  iod  horses.  It  was  the  plain  funeral  of  a  plain  man, 
cliit'oiing  from  other  displays  only  in  being  so  much  longer. 
The  people  came  to  look  on  because  the  man  whose  body  was 
carried  by  had  been  their  friend;  because,  as  Mr.  Beecher  well 
remarked,  he  had  been  '  feet  for  the  lame,  tongue  for  the  dumb, 
eyes  for  the  blind,  a  heart  for  those  who  had  none  to  sympathize 
with  them.'  l  Never,'  said  a  gray -haired  spectator  among  the 
crowd  on  Broadway,  'have  I  seen  such,  a  spontaneous  outpour- 
ing of  the  people,  or  the  masses  so  generally  and  so  deeply 
affected.'  From  the  rich  merchant,  who  closed  his  warehouse 
and  hung  the  building  with  festoons  of  black  and  white,  down 
to  the  beggar  who  stood  weeping  by  the  curb-stone,  all  were 
moved  by  a  common  impulse  of  affection  and  respect. 

"A  reporter  was  detailed  to  pass  along  the  route  of  the 
procession  a  half  mile  or  more  in  advance  of  the  cortege. 
From  Dr.  Chapin's  Church  to  Madison  Square,  a  distance  of 
just  a  mile,  the  avenue  was  nearly  blockaded.  On  the  outer 
edge  of  the  sidewalk  the  crowd  were  huddled  two  and  three 
deep.  On  the  walk  within  there  was  barely  room  to  pass.  The 
day  would  have  worn  a  holiday  aspect  but  for  the  quiet  and 
subdued  demeanour  of  the  people,  and  the  occasional  exhibi- 
tions of  sorrow.  About  Madison  square,  and  on  the  space 
before  the  Fifth  Avenue  Hotel,  the'  concourse  was  still  greater. 
All  along  Broadway  from  Fourteenth  street,  through  which 
the  procession  moved,  to  Hamilton  Ferry,  there  was  a  dense 
mass  of  people.  About  the  Bowling  Green,  the  Battery,  and 
the  ferry-house,  the  crowd  still  stood  patiently  waiting.  On 
the  Brooklyn  side  the  same  scenes  were  repeated.  Along 
Union  street  to  the  Fourth  avenue,  and  down  the  avenue  to 
the  Cemetery  stretched  the  wonderful  double  lines  or  watchers. 


DUST  TO   DUST.  555 

•.t  Grcej  \vood  was  a  stili  more  surprising  sight.  Here  an 
enormouc  concourse  had  gathered,  standing  about  the  entrance 
gate. ,  and  fringing  the  winding  roads,  and  concentrating  about 
the  ope  _  grave  so  that  the  mourners,  when  the  cortege  arrived, 
had  Lie  greatest  uifficulty  in  following  the  hearse." 

The  whole  ciiy  vas  in  mourning.    And  as  it  was  with  New 
York,  so  it  was  with  Brooklyn.     Flags  floated  at  half-mast. 
Vast  numbers  of  buildings  were  placed  in  mourning.     Trade, 
speculation,  all  branches  of  business  paused,  paying  reverential 
respect  to  ri'l  that  remained  of  this  devoted  friend  of  man. 

The  day  was  nearly  done  when  the  cortege  reached  tho 
cemetery,  and  stopped  on  Locust  Hill,  where  only  a  month 
before,  the  remains  of  Mrs.  Greeley  had  been  deposited.  The 
open  vault,  containing  the  bodies  of  his  wife  and  three  children, 
was  surrounded  by  a  vast  assemblage,  through  whom  it  was 
with  difficulty  the  police  made  way  for  the  procession.  A 
orief  prayer  followed,  the  body  was  lowered,  the  daughters, 
descending,  laid  upon  the  coffin  their  tribute  of  flowers,  with 
which  rest  forever  peacefully  the  ashes  of  Horace  Greeley ! 

The  following  letter  explains  itself.  We  clip  it  from  the  New 
York  Tribune  of  a  few  days  subsequent  to  the  funeral : 

To  PRESIDENT  GRANT — Sir:  I  trust  that  I  shall  not  be  charged  with 
presumption  in  addressing  you  on  the  subject  of  this  letter.  I  want  to 
thank  you,  not  for  any  favour  bestowed  on  my  friends,  or  shown  to  me. 
Thanks  for  such  things  are  as  common  as  the  benefits  they  confer.  1 
desire  to  thank  you  for  something  greater  and  better  than  these;  for 
something  much  beyond  the  ordinary  practice  of  high  official  life.  I 
desire  to  thank  you  for  the  respect  shown  by  you  to  Mr.  Greeley  on  his 
death-bed,  and  for  the  great  respect  you  paid  his  character  and  memory 
by  your  attendance  on  his  funeral.  It  was  a  great  compliment  for  the 
head  of  a  great  nation  to  decline  attendance  on  an  official  festivity  while 
a  private  citizen  was  dying,  a  citizen  who  had  no  claims  on  the  sympathy 
of  the  official,  either  of  blood  or  close  friendship.  It  was  a  much  greater 
compliment  when  that  Executive  laid  aside  the  pressing  duties  of  his 
great  office,  and,  making  a  night  journey  of  hundreds  of  miles  at  an 
inclement  season,  took  the  place  of  a  private  person,  among  the  thousands 
gathered  together  to  pay  the  last  tribute  of  respect  that  the  living  can  pay 
the  dead.  For  your  remembrance  of  Mr.  Greeley,  dying;  for  your 
attendance  at  his  funeral ;  for  the  tearful  attention  you  paid  to  the  sad 
ceremonies  of  that  occasion,  Mr.  President,  I  tiank  you  with  all  earnest- 
ness. I  am  very  sure  that  in  doing  so  I  but  echo  the  sentiments  of  hun- 


536  LIFE  OF  HORACE  GREELEY. 

drcils  of  thousands  of  your  fellow-citizens,  whose  views  of  pu'  l!c  affairs 
led  them  and  myself  to  support,  in  the  late  canvass,  the  mrn  to  'horn  y^u 
have  shown  such  high  respect.  By  these  acts  you  have  removed  p  .<?judic*v , 
changed  opponents  into  friends,  and  shown  the  world  th  -t  ".  at  official 
life  need  not  deaden  the  better  instincts  of  our  common  humanity.  By 
these  acts  you  have  taught  the  nations  that  Americans  never  target  what 
Is  due  to  the  character  of  their  great  citizens,  and  that  the  passioas  of  a 
exciting  political  contest  never  destroy  the  respect  that  American  partisan 
opponents  have  for  the  good  lives  of  good  ir  >n. 

I  thank  you,  Mr.  President,  and  pray  thrt  a  Ic  ig  and  happy  life  may 
await  you.  And  when  it  shall  please  the  G-eat  Ruler  to  send  the  angel 
of  Death  to  call  you  hence,  may  your  passage  to  the  comb  be  made  smooth 
by  the  affections  of  kind  friends,  and  the  grave  close  over  rou  with  the 
heartfelt  prayers  of  your  countrymen  for  your  eternal  rest 
Very  respectfully,  your  friend 

SINCL.  a  TOUSEY. 

NEW- YORK,  Dec.  6,  1872. 

But  the  funeral  of  Horace  Greeley  was  not  confined  to 
New- York.  It  was  a  national  ceremony ;  nay,  it  was  a  national 
reality.  The  people  everywhere  put  on  a  real  sorrow.  Those 
who  had  been  the  most  earnest  in  their  opposition  to  him  as 
a  candidate  for  the  Chief  Magistrate  no  less  sincerely  than  Mr. 
Tousey  thanked  the  President  for  his  act  of  beautiful  kindness 
in  attending  the  funeral,  in  unfriendly  criticism  of  which, 
there  was  but  one  voice  raised,  so  far  as  I  recollect,  in  all  the 
land.  With  this  exception,  the  whole  people  may  be  said  to 
have  profoundly  sorrowed  at  the  death  of  Horace  Greeley,  and 
to  have  wept  over  his  grave.  Thus  it  was  with  the  National 
Congress,  with  State  Legislatures,  with  the  Electoral  College, 
with  municipal  bodies,  in  all  parts  of  the  republic,  with  the 
press  and  pulpit. 


CHAPTEE   XXXI. 

TO  SUM  THE  WHOLE  — THE  CLOSE  OF  ALL. 

Review  of  the  Private  Life  and  Public  Services  of  Mr.  Greeley  —Estimate 
of  His  Genius  —  His  Character  —  The  Services  He  Rendered  HU 
Country  and  Mankind  —  A  Friend  of  the  Labouring  Man,  One  of  the 
People,  a  Great,  a  Good,  and  an  Honest  Man ,  though  not  a  Perfect 
Character. 

I  HAVE  thus  endeavoured  to  portray  the  private  life  and 
public  services  of  Horace  Greeley,  exercising  my  best  judgment 
in  the  selection  from  the  vast  amount  of  material  at  command 
those  facts,  writings,  utterances  which  would  appear  the  most 
correctly  and  fully  to  place  his  character  and  genius  before  the 
general  reader.  For  connected  accounts  of  his  life  I  have  been 
greatly  and  constantly  indebted  to  the  biography  by  Mr.  James 
Parton  and  to  the  " Kecollections  of  a  Busy  Life"  by  Mr. 
Greeley  himself.  Other  materials  I  have  found  in  history; 
the  lives  of  cotemporaries  with  whom  Mr.  Greeley  Mras  asso- 
ciated in  personal  or  political  friendship,  and  of  those  who 
opposed  him;  in  the  public  journals  of  the  times;  in  many 
letters;  in  the  statements  of  acquaintances;  in  my  own  obser- 
vation of  recent  events.  I  need  hardly  say  that  the  Life  of 
Horace  Greeley  which  shall  do  complete  and  full  justice  to  his 
benignant  character,  his  miriad-minded  genius,  the  services  he 
rendered  his  countrymen  and  mankind  by  his  long  and  unpar- 
alleled labours  in  their  behoof,  cannot  now  be  written.  Time 
must  eradicate  the  asperities,  the  misapprehensions,  the  mis- 
representations which  grew  out  of  the  discussions  in  which  he 
engaged,  the  reforms  and  revolutions  which  he  did  so  much  to 
promote.  When  sufficient  time  shall  have  elapsed  for  such  a 
work -to  be  accomplished,  and  to  be  received  by  the  public,  with 
honest,  unbiassed  judgment,  and  the  work  itself  shall  have 
been  written  with  truthfulness,  and  skill,  and  fullness,  —  then, 
and,  perhaps  not  till  then,  will  the  wonderful  life,  character, 

(557) 


558  IJFE   OF  HORACE  GKEELEY. 

and  genius  of  the  Founder  of  The  New- York  Tribune  be  com- 
pletely  understood  and  justly  appreciated.  Then  may  works 
of  this  nature  pass  out  of  public  attention.  Meantime,  they 
may  be  of  service,  not  only  because,  haply,  they  may  contain 
information  of  value  to  general  readers,  but  may  also  serve  to 
hasten  the  period  when  the  American  people  especially  shall 
willingly  do  justice  to  one  of  the  best  and  greatest  of  their 
countrymen. 

In  December,  1868,  the  societies  of  the  Army  of  the  Cum- 
berland, the  Army  of  the  Tennessee,  the  Army  of  the  Ohio, 
and  the  Army  of  Georgia,  held  a  reunion  in  the  city  of 
Chicago.  There  have  been  few  public  gatherings  of  more 
interest  than  this;  few  where  so  many  men  who  had  rendered 
their  country  great  service  were  collected  together;  none  where 
good  feeling  and  enthusiasm  were  so  irrepressibly  outspoken. 
Nor  has  there  ever  been  a  single  scene  of  more  historical  inter- 
est, or  more  grandly  imposing  in  itself,  than  when  the  thousands 
who  had  been  officers  in  the  principal  armies  of  the  West,  met 
together  to  hear  an  address  of  welcome  by  General  W.  T. 
Sherman,  and  an  oration  by  General  W.  W.  Belknap,  after- 
wards Secretary  of  War.  The  opening  sentences  of  the  latter's 
address  will  long  be  remembered  by  thousands  who  heard 
them:  "  Soldiers  of  the  Armies  of  the  Cumberland,  the  Ohio, 
and  Georgia;  Comrades  of  the  Army  of  the  Tennessee:  It 
all  seems  like  a  dream,  —  the  insult  to  the  flag;  the  President's 
call  for  troops;  the  great  uprising  of  the  people;  the  unfurling 
to  the  breeze,  from  every  mast  and  staff  and  spire  of  the  North, 
of  the  nation's  emblem;  the  enthusiastic  meetings  of  men 
of  all  classes  to  devise  means  in  that  solemn  hour  to 
strike  a  blow  for  union  and  save  the  nation;  the  prompt 
response  of  the  young  men  of  the  land;  the  muster-in  of 
armed  hosts;  the  waving  of  handkerchiefs,  and  the  hand- 
shakings at  parting,  and  the  last  kisses  of  the  loved;  the  first 
battles  in  the  West;  the  eager  demand  for  news;  the  victory 
at  Donelson,  where  began  the  public  life  of  a  new  leader  of 
the  Nation;  the  field  of  Shiloh,  with  its  bloody  victory  seized 
from  defeat;  the  gradual  opening  of  the  Father  of  Floods; 
Vicksburgh  with  its  memorable  siege;  the  return  home  aa 


HIS   WONDERFUL   CAREER.  5f>9 

veterans  of  those  who  but  a  short  time  before  had  loft  <>,8 
untried  youth;  the  proud  consciousness  of  the  youthful  sol-Uk-r, 
as  he  told  of  his  deeds  afar  off  in  the  wars;  the  return  to  the 
field;  the  flankings  and  lightings  of  our  great  Captain  about 
Atlanta,  until  it  was  'ours  and  fairly  won;'  the  sudden  depart- 
ure, as,  turning  their  backs  on  home,  the  men  of  this  Army 
made  their  march  to  the  sea;  Savannah  and  its  pleasant  holi- 
days of  rest;  the  seemingly  unceasing  swamps  of  Carolina; 
the  toilsome  march  to  Raleigh;  the  welcome  words  of  the 
announcement  which  told  of  the  surrender  of  the  flower  of 
the  Armies  of  the  South ;  the  joy  of  that  happy  hour  turned 
to  gloom,  as  the  hushed  intelligence  of  the  death  of  the 
nation's  Chief  was  broken  in  low  words  to  the  men;  the  final 
march  to  Washington;  the  grand  review  at  the  nation's  Capi- 
tal; the  last  order,  and  the  welcome  muster-out;  —  all  these 
memories  seem  not  like  memories,  but  like  the  faint  glimpses 
of  an  imagined  picture,  as,  panorama  like,  it  passes  before  the 
eye,  and  leaves  here  and  there  an  impress,  and  is  gone;  —  like 
the  half-faded  recollection  of  something  that  we  have  seen,  and 
yet  at  times  can  scarce  believe  that  we  have  witnessed.  *  * 
It  all  seems  like  a  dream!" 

When  we  consider  the  remarkable  career  of  Horace  Greeley, 
it  all  seems  like  a  dream.  Other  men  have  made  their  way 
from  pinching  poverty  to  luxury  and  afiiuence;  from  the  hum- 
blest walks  of  human  life  to  the  highest  positions  of  official 
station  or  of  intellectual  influence.  And  yet  there  are  few  if 
any  in  all  history  in  whose  lives  we  find  such  remarkable 
growth  in  many  mental  attributes  as  in  that  of  Horace  Greeley. 
Who  would  have  supposed,  when  he  first  entered  New- York 
as  uncouth  a  youth  as  ever  stepped  upon  Broadway,  or  for 
several  years  thereafter,  that  he  would  become  the  founder  of 
the  most  influential  journal  of  his  times!  Who  could  have 
any  more  than  dreamed,  listening  to  his  thin  voice  when  he 
delivered  his  lecture  upon  Human  Life,  that  he  would  become 
among  the  most  distinguished  of  his  co temporaries  upon  the 
platform;  that  he  would  come  to  deliver  public  addresses  more 
demonstrative  of  intellectual  greatness,  of  comprehensive, 
beneficent  statesmanship,  than  had  been  uttered  by  any  of  his 


£60  LIFE   OF   HORACE  GREELEY. 

c:;-ur:iryra.en!  How  it  would  have  been  placed  among  tlie  most 
fantastic  of  visions,  if  any  one  had  predicted,  that  from  the 
crucible  of  Horace  Greeley's  mind,  generally  detested  Fourier- 
ism  itself  would  come  forth  a  great  reform,  receiving  the 
hearty  assent  of  all  political  parties,  and  conferring  inestima- 
ble practical  good  upon  vast  numbers  of  people!  Who  would 
have  thought,  when  nearly  all  the  journals  of  New- York  were 
casting  ridicule  and  obloquy  upon  the  Editor  of  The  Tribune, 
or  when  the  wild  mob  roared  about  his  office  thirsting  for  his 
life,  that  the  great  metropolis  should  come  to  hold  him,  living, 
in  more  kindly  regard  than  any  of  her  citizens,  and,  upon  his 
death,  all  of  her  inhabitants,  stopping  business,  commerce, 
pleasure,  should  shed  tears  of  affectionate  sorrow  over  his 
remains  and  give  him  who  had  been  tl^e  plainest  man  in  all 
the  city,  a  far  greater  and  more  imposing  funeral  than  had 
been  accorded  to  the  most  illustrious  Chief  Magistrate  of  the 
republic!  How  like  a  beautiful,  thrilling  dream  does  the  life 
of  Horace  Greeley  appear,  when  we  cast  our  mind's  eye  rap- 
idly over  its  events.  Happily,  the  bright  visions  of  the  present 
become  the  realities  of  the  hereafter.  Time,  too,  ripens  vis- 
ionaries into  prophets. 

It  has  already  been  remarked  that,  after  the  establishment 
of  The  New- York  Tribune,  Mr.  Greeley  had  little  leisure  for 
the  cultivation  of  the  amenities  of  private  life,  because  of  the 
demands  upon  his  time  and  thoughts  of  the  most  exacting 
profession.  We  have  seen  how  great  was  his  love  of  family. 
His  affection  for  his  father  and  mother,  brothers  and  sisters, 
was  a  beautiful  trait  in  his  character.  The  assistance  he 
rendered  his  father,  ever  dividing  his  scanty  earnings  with 
him  while  poor  himself,  long  subjecting  himself  to  many  self- 
denials  that  he  might  give  the  more  aid,  is  an  instance  of  filial 
devotion  which  cannot  be  too  frequently  studied  by  i-apid  and 
rampant  Young  America.  In  his  own  family,  Mr.  Greeley 
was  a  devoted  husband  and  father.  Howsoever  tempestuous 
his  public  life,  that  of  home  was  ever  bright,  and  cheerful,  and 
merry.  If  afflictions  came,  as  they  often  did,  his  sorrow  was 
deep,  as  his  feelings  were  surpassingly  tender,  but  never 
developed  into  surliness.  If  he  were  sometimes  in  journal- 


HIS   GENEROSITY.  561 

ism  and  the  fierce  conflicts  through  which  so  much  of  his  life 
was  passed  as  impetuous  and  headstrong  as  Peter,  he  ever  at 
nome  with  his  family  and  particular  friends  resembled  the  dis- 
ciple whom  Jesus  loved.  Keen  observers  have  remarked  that 
dutiful,  loving  husbands  and  wives  sometimes  almost  become 
one  nature,  each  being  necessary  for  the  other,  and  that  in 
such  cases  it  often  happens  that  when  one  dies  the  other 
speedily  follows  to  the  better  land.  Whether  this  Was  the  case 
with  Horace  Greeley  may  never  be  known  in  time.  But  it  is 
probably  true  that  her  husband  was  the  only  person  on  earth 
who  fully  understood  Mrs.  Greeley,  and  that  his  wife  was  the 
only  person  in  all  the  world  who  fully  understood  Horace 
Greeley.  His  daughters,  doubtless,  would  have  come  to  do  so, 
had  Mr.  Greeley  lived  some  years  longer;  for  to  them  his 
heart  had  ever  gone  out  in  love,  which  but  increased  with 
time.  Thus  in  the  four-fold  character  of  son,  brother,  husband, 
father,  Horace  Greeley's  life  was  a  perfect  manifestation,  I 
think,  of  unmixed  goodness  and  greatness. 

In  social  conversation,  Mr.  Greeley  was  ever  able  to  talk 
well  upon  a  vast  variety  of  topics.  Though,  ordinarily,  his 
conversation,  like  most  of  his  writings,  was  upon  topics  of  a 
practical  nature,  and  with  the  object  of  accomplishing  some 
practical  good  too,  yet  would  he  often  talk  of  the  most 
abstruse  questions  of  religion,  of  philosophy,  of  science,  and 
with  a  boldness  of  thought  which  would  have  astonished  many 
persons.  He  often  exhibited  keen  wit  and  droll  humour  in 
conversation,  and  was  ever  quick  and  sparkling  in  repartee. 
His  construction  of  sentences  in  conversation  was  ever  unex- 
ceptionable, but  he  had  the  habit  of  conversational  contraction 
of  words.  One  would  frequently  hear  him  say  "  don't,"  "  won't," 
"  shan't,"  and  the  like. 

Mr.  Greeley's  generosity  appears  to  have  been  entirely 
boundless.  He  probably  gave  away  more  money,  according  to 
his  means,  than  almost  any  other  man  who  ever  lived.  He  did 
not  have  the  capacity  to  resist  an  appeal  to  his  benevolence. 
His  compassion  for  those  who  suifered,  for  those  who  were  in 
want,  was  surpassingly  great  and  tender.  His  generous  dis- 
positions not  unfrequently  led  him  into  mistakes  which  were  a 
36 


562  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

heavy  tax  upon  liis  purse,  and  he  finally  put  an  end  to  caroless 
giving  and  endorsing,  but  death  alone  had  power  to  stop  his 
generous  acts  and  his  deeds  of  charity. 

Horace  Greeley  was  by  nature  entitled  to  "the  grand  old 
name  of  gentleman."  He  was,  indeed,  always  a  democrat — 
one  of  the  people.  The  manners,  the  fashions  of  polite  society 
he  never  adopted.  Nor  is  it  necessary,  to  be  a  gentleman,  that 
one  should  adopt  those  manners  and  fashions.  They  too  often 
cover  rudeness,  coarseness  of  heart,  supreme  selfishness,  sordid, 
intriguing  vice.  Remove  the  shell  and  you  may  sometimes 
see  a  boor,  sometimes  even  a  scoundrel.  In  deference  to  the 
wishes  and  feelings  of  others,  in  subordinating  one's  self  to  the 
general  enjoyment,  to  the  pleasure  and  happiness  of  those 
about  one,  one  may  exhibit  all  gentlemanly  qualities,  though 
one  be  clothed  in  homespun  and  ignorant  of  many  conven- 
tional rules.  Such  was  the  gentlemanliness  of  Horace  Greeley 
that  he  instinctively  treated  all  whom  he  met  with  kindness 
and  natural  courtesy.  If,  as  we  have  seen,  he  sometimes  made 
use  of  harsh,  insulting  expressions  in  editorials  and  undig- 
nified expressions  in  conversation,  we  have  also  seen  that  these 
were  faults  growing  out  of  his  stormy  public  life  rather  than 
developments  of  natural  instincts. 

That  indescribable  intellectual  power  which  we  call  genius 
Horace  Greeley  possessed  as  man  has  rarely  possessed  it.  He 
himself  once  said  that  genius  is  "Work.  Certainly  those  who 
have  become  the  most  celebrated  of  men  have  in  every  instance 
been  notable  workers.  A  few,  in  spirit  of  false  pride,  have 
undertaken  to  deceive  their  cotemporaries  into  the  belief  that 
they  dashed  off  works,  or,  perhaps,  poems,  at  a  single  sitting, 
and  rather  as  relaxation  than  work;  but  it  has  always  been 
discovered,  after  their  death,  that  it  was  through  hard  work, 
years  of  study,  that  they  acquired  the  capacity  of  doing  with 
apparent  ease  that  which  would  cost  others  great  toil,  and 
which,  no  matter  how  long  and  hard  they  might  toil,  most 
men  could  not  do  at  all.  In  her  introduction  to  a  volume  of 
Speeches  upon  Political  Questions  by  George  "VV.  Julian,  Mrs. 
L.  Maria  Child,  speaking  of  that  statesman,  says:  "Like 
many  of  our  distinguished  citizens,  he  id  what  is  called  '  a  self- 


HIS   GENIUS   FOE   PUBLIC   AFFAIRS.  563 

made  man ;'  a  class  that  would  be  better  designated  as  labour- 
made  men."  Perhaps  it  makes  little  difference  whether  we 
use  the  one  designation  or  the  other,  seeing  that  among 
genuinely  great  men  there  are  only  those  who  are  self-made  or 
labour-made.  Whenever  God  gives  greatness  or  the  capacity 
to  achieve  it,  to  a  man,  it  is  always  upon  the  condition  pre- 
cedent of  great  labour  on  the  part  of  the  recipient  of  the  gift. 
The  seeming  exceptions  to  the  rule  will  be  found,  upon  careful 
examination,  not  to  be  exceptions  at  all.  Even  Thomson,  who 
was  so  lazy  that  he  would  eat  peaches  from  the  tree,  rather 
than  put  himself  to  the  trouble  of  taking  his  hands  out  of 
his  pockets  to  pluck  the  fruit,  was  a  hard  worker,  mentally. 
A  little  further  on  Mrs.  Child  quotes  from  the  Quaker,  Elias 
Hicks,  "  It  takes  live  fish  to  swim  up  stream." 

But  wherever  we  may  place  the  source  of  this  wonderful 
intellectual  power  called  genius,  and  whatever  we  may  think 
as  to  its  necessary  aids,  it  is  certain  that  Horace  Greeley,  even 
from  early  boyhood,  was  a  constant,  hard  student.  The  genius 
of  reform  was  early  developed  in  him  as  we  have  see*n.  Of 
this  irrepressible  spirit  of  righting  wrongs,  Martin  Luther 
himself  was  not  more  greatly  possessed  than,  Horace  Greeley. 
He  also  very  early  in  life  manifested  a  genius  for  public  affairs. 
Years  before  he  had  reached  legal  majority  he  understood  the 
political  issues  before  the  people,  and  the  rationale  of  our  goy- 
ernment  far  more  thoroughly  than  any  other  person  in  the 
community.  His  knowledge  of  the  details  of  political  affairs 
came  to  be  wonderful.  Mr.  Julius  Henri  Browne,  in  his  appre- 
ciative article  in  Harper's  Monthly,  to  which  reference  has 
already  been  made,  says :  "  Mr.  Greeley's  memory  was  as 
retentive  as  Pascal's.  His  mind  was  a  marvellous  store-house 
of  facts,  dates,  and  events.  He  seemed  to  forget  nothing  worth 
remembering.  He  was  a  political  cyclopedia  of  the  best  revised 
edition,  and  entirely  trustworthy  for  the  last  forty  years.  He 
was  every  hour  of  the  day  what  The  Tribune  Almanac  is  at 
the  close  of  December.  It  was  hard  for  him  to  understand 
how  any  member  of  his  profession  could  be  ignorant  or  obli- 
vious of  ten  thousand  things  which  few  besides  himself  held 
in  recollection.  He  thought  every  journalist  should  have  at 


£64  LIFE    OF    HORACE   OREELET. 

least  cotemporaneous  political  facts  and  data  at  immediate 
command."  The  truth  is,  Mr. Greeley  had  a  genius  for  "facts, 
dates,  and  events."  Most  others  do  not  hold  these  ten  thou- 
sand things  in  recollection  because  it  is  beyond  their  capacity 
to  do  so. 

This  genius  for  public  affairs  of  which  I  speak  amounted  to 
statesmanship.  He  was  three  months  in  Congress,  and  he 
accomplished  more  for  the  country  in  that  short  period  than 
a  large  number  of  men  of  national  reputation  have  accom- 
plished during  many  years  of  official  life.  His  political 
speeches  during  the  Presidential  campaign  of  1872  are  unpar- 
alleled in  our  history.  We  shall  presently  speak  more  at 
length  of  the  results  of  his  labours  as  a  statesman. 

But  it  was  as  a  journalist  that  Mr.  Greeley 's  genius  was 
most  conspicuously  illustrated.  It  is  universally  agreed  that 
he  was  the  greatest  of  American  journalists;  the  founder  of 
the  most  influential  of  newspapers.  Mr.  Greeley  was  not 
superior  to  all  other  great  editors  in  that  enterprise  which  pro- 
cures intelligence  of  passing  events  at  the  earliest  practicable 
moment.  He  was  not  equal  to  others  in  making  journalism 
profitable.  There  are  two  ideas  of  journalism  extant  in  the 
land,  radically  different  the  one  from  the  other.  One  is,  that  a 
newspaper  is  solely  a  business  establishment  for  the  sale  of 
news  and  such  matters  of  intelligence  as  the  public  will  be 
likely  to  buy.  The  other  idea  is  that  a  journal  should  be  not 
only  the  medium  of  all  current  intelligence  but  a  teacher  also. 
It  should  have  ideas  of  its  own;  convictions.  No  newspaper 
was  ever  better,  as  such,  than  The  Tribune;  not  one  has 
equalled  it  as  a  teacher  of  the  people.  Every  one  of  the  great 
morning  journals  of  New- York  is  this  day  a  better  paper  than 
it  would  have  been  but  for  Horace  Greeley.  And  what  is  true 
of  them  is  true  of  all  the  other  great  journals  of  our  country. 
He  enlarged  the  sphere  of  journalism  vastly.  More  by  his 
influence  than  that  of  any  other  journalist  the  public  press 
became,  not  only  a  record  of  the  world's  current  events,  but 
also  of  its  ideas.  It  became  very  much  more  than  a  mere 
chronicle,  however  full  and  varied  that  chronicle  might  be.  It 
became  also  the  guardian  of  the  people's  rights,  as  such 


HIS   CHARACTER.  566 

respected  by  government  and  parties.  Very  largely  through 
his  influence  it  became  the  instructor  of  the  people,  lifting 
them  up  to  a  plane  of  intelligence  never  before  reached;  an 
institution  more  powerful  than  law,  more  potential  than  gov- 
ernment,—  an  institution  so  interwoven  with  the  trade,  the 
commerce,  the  labour,  the  thoughts,  the  progress,  the  happi- 
ness, of  society  that  its  corruption  or  its  destruction  would  be 
an  unspeakable  calamity  to  mankind.  The  overthrow  of  the 
best  government  would  produce  less  permanent  ill  than  the 
overthrow  of  that  all-comprehensive,  independent  public  jour- 
nalism which  the  genius  of  Horace  Greeley  was  so  preeminently 
influential  in  establishing.  It  was  because  he  knew  that  this 
institution,  —  its  representative  men  guarding  its  purity  and 
attending  to  its  development  with  due  vigilance  and  energy, — 
would  become  the  means  of  the  most  beneficent  influence  in 
behalf  of  the  world's  education,  peace,  progress,  happiness, 
that  he  desired  most  of  all  to  be  remembered  as  the  Founder 
of  The  New- York  Tribune. 

We  have  seen  that  Mr.  Greeley's  opinions  and  acts  were 
often  not  only  misunderstood,  but  grossly  misrepresented. 
Such  was  also  the  case  in  respect  to  his  character.  Wherefore, 
Julius  Henri  Browne  most  appropriately  commenced  his  mag- 
azine essay,  "Horace  Greeley,"  with  the  quotation  from 
Emerson  —  to  be  great,  is  to  be  misunderstood  —  following  it 
with  the  remark  that  if  the  converse  of  this  be  true,  Horace 
Greeley  was  undeniably  the  greatest  man  of  his  age.  The 
idiosyncrasies  of  Mr.  Greeley's  character  have  not  been  more 
happily  or  truthfully  stated  than  by  this  writer: 

Eccentric  and  inconsistent  as  he  seemed,  and  was  to  a  certain  extent, 
law  and  method  were  perceptible  through  all  his  vagaries  to  a  mind  capa- 
ble of  insight  and  sympathy.  Tracing  his  peculiarities  to  their  source, 
instead  of  looking  at  them  externally,  his  nature  was  found  to  have  a  liar- 
inony  seldom  suspected  by  his  ordinary  acquaintances.  He  was  mainly 
different  from  his  fellows  in  that  he  obeyed  his  impulses  and  said  what  he 
thought.  All  his  journeyings,  his  prominent  and  commanding  position 
in  politics  for  thirty  years,  his  association  with  distinguished  and  leading 
minds,  and  his  entirely  secular  pursuits,  never  made  Mr.  Greeley  a  man  of 
the  world.  He  never  achieved — he  never  appeared  to  care  for  —  self- 
discipline,  continuing  to  the  very  last  his  habit  of  giving  -way  to  irrita- 
bility and  petulance  like  a  spoiled  child.  Ic  a  word,  he  was  natural,  and 


Co 6  UFE  OF  HORACE  GEEELEY. 

r.:-f  ie3<?  *>.ltogetner  to  be  bound  by  mere  fonns  or  conventionalities.  He 
*vas  sc  sincere  that  he  seemed  at  times  disingenuous,  and  so  candid  that 
he  was  charged  with  indirection.  Coupled  all  his  life  with  politicians, 
though  rarely  in  harmony  with  them,  the  contrast  between  his  plainness 
and  their  pretense  was  rendered  especially  remarkable.  Because  they 
could  not  manage  him  they  called  him  crotchety,  and  pronounced  him 
unstable  for  the  reason  that  he  would  not  do  their  bidding.  Liberal  to 
prodigality  as  he  was  in  expression,  he  had  certain  reserves  touching  his 
personality,  and  of  these  he  spoke  not  to  his  nearest  friends.  He  often 
left  his  acts  to  strange  conjectures,  when  a  word  from  him  would  have 
made  his  conduct  clear.  His  privacy  he  held  sacred,  rightly  thinking  that 
with  it  the  public  had  nothing  to  do.  His  opinions  respecting  men  and 
measures  were  at  the  command  of  almost  anybody;  but  his  innermost 
Ich,  as  the  German  metaphyscians  would  put  it,  could  not  be  evoked. 

The  distinguished  journalist's  nature  was  eminently  dual,  and  they  who 
failed  to  recognize  this  were  without  the  key  to  his.  mystery.  Self-made 
men  —  and  few  men  have  owed  so  little  as  he  to  circumstances  —  are  prone 
to  incompleteness.  One  side  of  their  character  is  developed  at  the  expense 
of  the  other.  Their  struggle  is  too  severe  to  give  leisure  for  roundness 
or  finish,  and  when  they  rise  their  eminence  renders  their  defects  more 
palpable.  The  hardness  which  usually  comes  from  protracted  battle  with 
fortune  did  not  belong  to  Mr.  Greeley.  On  the  contrary,  he  was  inclined 
to  sentiment,  and  yet  wholly  practical  in  his  plans  and  modes  of  accom- 
plishment. But  his  mind  had  been  ceaselessly  stimulated,  while  his 
manners  were  neglected,  and  the  crudity  of  these  sometimes  interfered 
with  the  proper  appreciation  of  his  manifold  virtues.  All  his  imperfec- 
tions were  on  the  surface,  and  many  of  them  were  so  conspicuous  that 
they  could  not  escape  general  observation.  If  he  had  taken  half  the  pains 
to  correct  those  that  he  took  to  develop  his  intellect  and  keep  his  life  pure 
and  sweet,  he  would  have  been  regarded  as  a,  pattern  in  place  of  a  humour- 
ist. His  faults  sprang  from  his  early  straits  and  hardships,  which  wore 
insufficient,  however,  to  choke  the  good  seeds  implanted  by  nature,  and 
afterward  ripening  into  such  wholesome  fruit. 

Mr.  G-reeley's  duality  was  in  his  sterling  manhood  and  his  unconquered 
childishness.  No  one  doubted  his  greatness;  but  this  frequently  under- 
went eclipse  through  his  deplorable  lack  of  discipline.  Almost  in  the 
same  moment  that  he  would  prove  himself  a  sage  and  seer  he  would  fall 
into  peevishness,  and  indulge  in  freaks  which  should  have  shamed  a  rustic 
school-boy.  In  this  way  he  put  weapons  of  ridicule  into  the  hands  of  his 
antagonists,  and  strengthened  their  disposition  to  misinterpret  him.  To 
his  vagaries  of  temper  and  personal  whimsies  he  was  indebted  for  the 
numberless  absurdities  associated  with  his  name.  While  a  few  were  aware 
of  the  gross  injustice  of  the  caricatures  put  forward  as  his  true  portrait, 
the  great  mass  fancied  him  to  be  not  materially  unlike  those  satirical  rep- 
resentations. *  For  a  long  while  nothing  was  too  ridiculous  or  monstrous 
to  be  discredited  if  told  of  Mr.  Greeley,  and  witlings  of  the  country  press, 
being  conscious  of  this,  were  perpetually  making  him  the  grotesque  hero 


HIS   CHARACTER.  567 

of  impossible  adventures,  and  the  subject  of  interminable  paragraphs.  Of 
late  years,  however,  these  fictions  were  carried  so  far  that  they  ceased  to  gain 
credence  even  with  the  most  ignorant,  though  they  still  continued  to  excite 
merriment  among  those  with  whom  iteration  never  loses  novelty.  After 
the  breaking  out  of  our  civil  war,  all  persons  of  intelligence,  whatever 
their  party,  learned  to  respect  Mr.  Greeley,  because  they  thought  him  a 
man  of  earnest  convictions,  of  broad  humanity,  and  inflexible  principle. 
Many  considered  him  impractical,  mistaken,  visionary ;  but  his  sincerity 
and  integrity  were  seldom  questioned. 

Judging  The  Tribune  philosopher  sympathetically,  and  making  all 
allowances  for  his  untrained  youth,  he  must  still  be  regarded  as  a  charac- 
ter combining  numerous  antagonisms  —  and  for  the  reason  that  he  was 
one  thing  through  his  intellect,  and  something  else  through  his  tempera- 
ment. He  counselled  conservatism  and  expediency  sometimes,  and  was 
himself  radical  and  headstrong.  Principles  absorbed  him;  men  scarcely 
touched  him  at  all.  Calm  in  mental  atmospheres,  he  parted  with  self- 
restraint  in  personal  associations.  Measures  impressed  him;  politicians 
annoyed  him.  Intemperate  as  he  was  occasionally  with  his  pen,  he  was 
more  so  with  his  tongue  —  the  ready  vehicle  of  his  irritation.  His  want 
of  discipline  prompted  him  to  yield  to  his  moods,  which  were  many  and 
contradictory,  and  not  to  be  foreseen  even  by  himself.  As  may  be  sup- 
posed, his  casual  acquaintances  judged  him  by  his  manners,  and  the 
public  by  his  mind ;  and  this  accounts  for  the  different  views  held  of 
Horace  Greeley  the  individual,  and  Horace  Greeley  the  journalist  and 
reformer.  In  the  latter  capacity  he  will  go  down  to  posterity ;  the  coming 
years  will  swallow  up  his  minor  defects,  and  leave  his  large  virtues  only 
to  be  remembered. 

If  it  was  Mr.  Greeley's  fate  to  be  misapprehended,  much  of  this  misap- 
prehension arose  from  his  own  waywardness, "mood iness,  and  determination 
not  to  set  himself  right.  Assured  of  the  rectitude  of  his  conduct,  he  was 
careless  of  the  impression  formed  of  it,  except  in  instances  where  temper 
about  trifles  got  the  better  of  his  native  judgment.  He  would  be  patient 
and  reticent  under  a  serious  accusation,  when  a  petty  paragraph  in  an 
obscure  journal  would  drive  him  to  exasperation.  He  would  declare  his 
supreme  unconcern  as  to  the  opinions  expressed  of  some  policy  he  had 
chosen,  and  an  hour  later  would  write  a  card,  bitterly  personal,  upon  a 
matter  too  trivial  to  be  noticed.  His  friends  could  not  be  certain  of  him, 
for  he  could  not  be  certain  of  himself.  His  growing  up  wild,  so  to  speak, 
left  a  certain  trace  of  social  savagery  in  his  nature  that  could  not  be 
eradicated  subsequently,  even  had  he  made  an  effort  to  that  end.  After 
every  attempt  to  explain  his  eccentricities  and  reconcile  his  inconsisten- 
cies, something  of  the  unintelligible  will  adhere  to  his  character,  which 
was  unquestionably  unique.  He  was  not  only  unlike  other  men  —  he  was 
unlike  himself  often.  General  rules  failed  to  apply  to  him  on  account  of 
numerous  exceptions,  which,  in  his  case,  might  almost  have  been  bound 
into  a  rule. 


568  IIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

There  was  no  particle  of  deceitfulness  in  Mr.  Greeley's  char- 
acter. His  naturalness,  sincerity,  candour,  plainness,  were 
ever  manifest.  No  man  was  ever  more  richly  endued  with 
practicality,  no  one  ever  had  his  life  guided  by  more  lofty 
heroic  sentiment.  As  the  critics  have  pronounced  Fenimore 
Cooper's  character,  "Leather-stocking,"  a  poet  in  reality, 
though  he  could  hardly  spell  his  own  name,  so  Horace  Greeley 
found  beauty  and  sublimity  in  many  things  which  were  to 
others  common-place,  and  lived  in  an  atmosphere  of  exalted 
feeling  and  reflection  not  at  all  of  the  earth  earthy.  His 
earnestness  was  one  of  his  most  notable  characteristics.  I 
think  he  did  not  know  fear.  •  He  appeared  perfectly  uncon- 
cerned on  the  floor  of  Congress  when  all  others  were  fiercely 
excited;  he  laughed  at  the  mob  which  caused  the  cheeks  of 
men  who  had  faced  the  cannon's  mouth  to  blanch.  Perfect 
integrity  was  blood  of  his  blood  and  bone  of  his  bone.  He 
never  drew  a  dishonest  breath.  He  was  so  perfectly  honest 
that  he  could  not  assume  the  meaningless  hypocricies  of  social 
courtesies.  Much  of  his  alleged  irritability  was,  in  fact,  but 
manifestation  of  his  downright  honesty.  "  Mr.  Greeley,"  said 
the  gentleman-usher  of  a  delegation  of  Republican  politicians 
who  once  called  to  instruct  him  as  to  the  conduct  of  the  cam- 
paign in  New  York,  "  these  gentlemen  have  great  influence  in 
the  State;  they  are  of  the  highest  standing;  they  are — "  "  A 
set  of  confounded  asses,"  broke  in  Mr.  Greeley,  "who  are 
wasting  their  time  and  trying  to  waste  mine  by  coming  here." 
At  the  bottom  of  this  there  was  something  very  different  from 
rudeness.  To  his  liberality  there  was  no  limit,  as  there  was 
not,  either,  to  his  magnanimity.  A  more  thorough  American, 
a  more  genuine  democrat,  never  lived.  Had  he  become  Presi- 
dent of  the  United  States,  he  would  have  reformed  the  glitter- 
ing style  of  the  Capital  to  the  simplicity  and  beauty  of  the 
elder  times;  and  voluptuous  lives  would  have  been  kindly 
rebuked  and  chastened  under  the  influence  of  his  unspotted 
purity. 

Such  the  genius,  such  the  character  of  Horace  Greeley,  he 
was  able  to  render  his  countrymen  and  mankind  services  of 
inestimable  value,  all  the  good  results  of  which  shall  not,  cease 


HIS    PUBLIC   SERVICES.  569 

nntil  the  human  race  shall  have  accomplished  its  destiny  and 
passed  away.  If  the  best  genius  be  really  Work,  who  ever 
possessed  it  in  higher  degree  or  greater  measure  than  he? 

When  he  was  engaged  in  the  hard  work  of  conducting 
partisan  newspapers,  he  did  much  to  dignity  and  ennoble 
politics.  The  Jetfersonian  campaign  journal  was  not  only 
potential  in  giving  New  York  to  the  Whigs,  but  was  repre- 
sentative of  a  lofty  political  morality  and  of  a  broad  and 
earnest  patriotism.  The  Log-Cabin  newspaper  could  never 
have  gained  its  wide  circulation  and  unequalled  influence,  even 
during  the  exciting  campaign  in  which  it  originated,  but  for 
the  fact  that  it  was  not  approached  by  any  of  its  great  and 
brilliant  rivals,  in  the  presentation  of  arguments  for  the  reform 
and  purification  of  government,  and  in  the  advocacy  of 
measures  for  the  well-being  of  the  people.  And  afterwards, 
during  the  continuance  of  the  Whig  party,  Hjorace  Greeley, 
though  ever  identified  with  that  organization  was  much  more 
than  a  Whig.  Once  formally  and  expressly,  and  many  times 
in  reality,  he  utterly  disavowed  the  platform  of  the  party,  an(J 
was  constantly  enraging  the  managers  and  the  manipulators 
by  the  advocacy  of  reforms  outside  of  party,  which  were  at  the 
time  unpopular.  If  the  Whig  party  did  not  earnestly  oppose  a 
war  in  the  interest  of  slavery,  if  it  did  not  become  the 
champion  of  Free  Soil,  it  was  because  it  failed  to  see  the  right 
and  into  the  future  as  Horace  Greeley  did. 

Mr.  Greeley's  services  in  the  Republican  party  were  great, 
not  only  in  securing  success  for  that  organization,  but  in 
behalf  of  the  country,  when  it  obtained  control  of  the  govern- 
ment. Not  a  beneficent  measure,  not  a  wise  policy  to  which 
that  party  gave  success  but  had  Horace  Greeley  among  its 
earliest  friends  and  for  its  bravest,  most  eificient  advocate. 
And  he  departed  from  it  the  moment  he  was  convinced  that  it 
could  not  be  trusted  to  carry  out  policies  and  reforms  for  the 
pacification  of  the  country  and  the  purification  of  the  govern- 
ment. When,  as  he  conceived,  the  progress  and  prosperity  of 
the  republic,  the  present  and  future  welfare  of  the  people, 
demanded  the  disruption  of  existing  parties  and  the  formation 
of  a  new  one,  he  severed  old  political  ties  and  associated  him- 


570  LTFE  OF  HORACE  GEEELEY. 

pelf  with  those  in  y  the  success  of  whose  principles  lay  the 
highest  good  for  all  his  countrymen.  Sooner  or  later  the 
whole  people  will  agree  that  the  reforms  of  which  Horace 
Greeley  became  the  most  eminent  representative  man  in  1872 
were  based  upon  wisdom,  the  highest  statesmanship,  the 
loftiest  and  purest  patriotism;  and  that  if  those  reforms  shall 
be  long  postponed,  it  can  only  be  through  the  most  melancholy 
calamity  if  not  the  ruin  of  his  country. 

I  have  said  that  Ilorace  Greeley  was,  while  he  acted  with 
the  "Whig  party,  much  more  than  a  Whig.  So,  too,  he  was 
more  than  a  Republican,  and  then  more  than  a  Liberal.  Ho 
was  not  like  Burke, 

"Who,  born  for  the  universe,  narrowed  his  mind, 
And  to  party  gave  up  what  was  meant  for  mankind." 

How  many  reforms  did  he  advocate  when  they  were  un- 
popular! Among  American  statesmen  he  may  be  regarded  as 
the  originator  of  the  Homestead  policy.  It  is  difficult  to 
believe  that  when  he  first  introduced  and  advocated  a  Home- 
stead bill  in  Congress,  it  was  treated  with  ridicule  and  taunts 
and  received  only  his  own  vote.  The  Temperance  reform  ever 
had  in  him  an  earnest  and  powerful  friend.  Among  the 
earliest  and  strongest  advocates  of  cheap  postage,  he  for  years  in- 
curred the  displeasure  of  men  in  office  by  his  persistent  demand 
for  the  abolition  of  the  franking  privilege.  Who  was  an 
earlier  or  more  powerful  friend  of  Emancipation  than  Horace 
Greeley!  There  was  not  one  who  so  strongly  and  persistently 
urged  the  wisdom  and  the  justice  of  impartial  suffrage.  There 
was  no  policy  of  the  reconstruction  of  the  Union  after  the 
war  of  the  rebellion  having  so  much  of  wisdom,  and  justice, 
and  safety,  and  greatness  in  it  as  the  policy  enunciated  by 
Horace  Greeley  before  the  thunders  of  the  terrible  conflict 
had  been  entirely  stilled.  And  whensoever  and  wheresoever 
that  policy  was  adopted,  it  was  at  once  shown  to  be  as  practi- 
cally beneficent,  as  it  was  generous,  magnanimous  in  idea. 
To  Labour  Reform  he  ever  gave  hearty  assent  and  effective 
work.  Erase  from  our  legislation  and  our  history  the  measures 
which  have  been  of  the  greatest  good  to  the  people,  the 


HIS   SERVICES  TO    MANKIND.  571 

reforms  of  the  highest  importance  to  the  welfare  of  the  hody 
politic  and  the  benefit  of  all  mankind,  with  which  the  name 
of  Horace  Greeley  is  associated  as  a  prominent  and  efficient 
friend,  and  that  legislation  and  history  would  have  so  little  in 
it  of  credit  to  our  nationality  that  no  detriment  would  come 
to  the  good  name  of  the  republic  should  the  memory  of  it 
entirely  pass  away.  Think  of  the  United  States  without  the 
Pacific  Railroad,  without  Emancipation,  without  impartial 
suffrage,  without  the  homestead  act,  without  the  sanctity  of 
the  national  debt,  without  cheap  postage,  without  the  educar 
tion  of  all  the  people,  without  amnesty  for  our  "  lately  erring 
countrymen,"  without  the  triumph  of  argument  and  reason 
for  the  settlement  of  international  difficulties!  Such  would 
be  the  country,  entitled  to  small  share  of  high  respect  and 
admiration,  but  for  the  policies  and  reforms  of  which  Horace 
Greeley  was  as  influential  a  representative  man  as  any  of  his 
cotemporaries.  Of  some  of  these  policies  and  measures, 
with  more  of  like  nature  that  might  be  mentioned,  he  was  a 
friend,  when  to  be  their  friend  was  unpopularity,  misrepre- 
sentation, obloquy. 

But  the  greatest  service  which  Horace  Greeley  rendered  his 
country  and  mankind  was  in  the  establishment  and  conduct  of 
The  New- York  Tribune.  And  this  not  only  because  the 
journal  placed  in  his  hands  a  means  of  influence  more  effica- 
cious than  any  office  could  have  done,  but  because  of  the 
character  of  his  paper  and  in  the  good  it  conferred  upon  the 
people  of  his  own  and  of  other  countries  in  very  many  ways. 

The  expression  is  hackneyed,  but  it  is  true  that  his  journal 
was  from  the  day  of  its  establishment  The  Tribune  of  the 
People.  If,  during  the  existence  of  the  Whig  party,  it  was 
trammelled  by  partizan  necessities,  yet  even  then  did  it  fear- 
lessly and  generously  give  fair  play  to  every  struggling  reform 
and  a  candid  examination  to  all  ideas  in  whose  realization 
practical  good  might  be  accomplished.  After  the  demise  of 
the  Whig  party,  it  made  a  new  departure  in  respect  of  the 
discussion  of  political  topics.  "  It  became,"  said  The  Chicago 
Tribune,  "  the  champion  of  freedom,  the  champion  of  the  men 
held  in  slavery,  the  champion  of  a  Free  Republic.  Restrained 


672  LIFE   OF   HORACE   ORKEI.ET. 

by  no  platforms,  by  no  considerations  of  mere  expediency,  by 
the  hopes  of  no  candidates,  it  made  the  direct  fight  in  behalf 
of  the  principles  of  Truth,  Freedom,  and  Justice.  It  fired  the 
Northern  heart;  it  ronsed  the  slumbering  instincts  of  human 
justice;  it  tore  men  from  old  party  associations;  it  placed 
the  question  in  the  light  that  men  had  to  choose  between  right 
and  wrong;  it  revolutionized  public  sentiment,  and  revolu- 
tionized parties,  and  brought  about  that  grand  decision  that 
it  was  possible  to  elect  a  government  which  was  under  no 
obligation  to  uphold  Slavery  or  permit  its  extension."  The 
meaning  of  this  is,  and  it  is  perfectly  true,  that  Horace  Gree- 
ley  organized  victory  for  a  Free-Soil  party.  He  made  the 
success  of  the  Republican  party  possible.  Whatever  great 
good  it  was  able  to  confer  upon  the  country  was  very  largely 
due  to  the  influence  and  power  of  The  New- York  Tribune. 
Government  itself  is  a  means,  not  an  end, — a  means  whereby 
the  good  of  the  body  politic  may  be  accomplished.  Much 
more  is  party  a  means,  its  end  being  to  gain  possession  of  the 
government.  Horace  Greeley,  both  through  The  Tribune  and 
as  a  practical  politician,  did  more  for  the  organization  of  the 
Republican  party  than  any  other  one  of  our  statesmen.  When 
the  party  had  gained  control  of  the  government,  he  did  more 
to  control  its  vital  policy  than  any  other.  Contrast  the  sublime 
spirit  of  his  letter  to  President  Lincoln, — "  The  Prayer  of 
Twenty  Millions," — with  President  Lincoln's  flouting  reply! 
"  The  Prayer  "  had  to  be  answered  by  a  better  reply  than  that. 
It  came  in  the  proclamation  which  has  canonized  its  author. 
President  Lincoln  wrote  the  Proclamation;  it  was  Horace 
Greeley  who  inspired  it.  Thus  he  organized  parties,  led  them 
to  victory,  and  theli  the  government  to  the  performance  of  its 
greatest  and  most  beneficent  acts;  to  the  adoption  of  polity 
conferring  the  highest  good  upon  his  country  and  exerting 
the  best  influence  upon  mankind. 

So  was  it  demonstrated  that  the  people  need  not  be  subject 
either  to  party  domination  or  governmental  errors  long 
pursued;  that,  as  they  are  themselves  the  creators  of  parties 
and  of  government,  so  they  have  the  means  of  coercing,  if 
need  be,  both  the  one  and  the  other,  to  the  execution  of  their 


HIS   SERVICES   TO    MANKIND.  573 

sovereign  will.  And  this,  not  by  force  but  by  argument  and 
reason. 

The  independent  press  is  undoubtedly  one  of  the  beneficent 
logical  developments  of  the  free  institutions  established  by  the 
founders  of  our  American  Republic.  But  in  giving  that  press 
character  as  representative  of  the  whole  people,  armed,  there- 
fore, with  power  superior  to  that  of  party  or  of  the  state,  the 
genius  "of  Horace  Greeley  was  preeminently  originating  and 
potential.  And  it  is  not  impossible  that  the  establisment  thus 
of  public  journalism  as  a  powerful  means  to  the  people  of 
peaceful  revolution,  while  not  ceasing  to  be  their  daily  teacher, 
may  come  to  be  generally  regarded  as  amongst  the  greatest 
victories  of  freedom.  A  score  of  great  journals,  thoroughly 
independent,  unbought  and  unpurchasable,  are  a  safer  defense 
-of  the  rights  and  liberties  of  the  people,  than  the  constitutional 
obligations  of  all  the  partizans  of  all  parties. 

But  Horace  Greeley  not  only  rendered  this  service  of  incal- 
culable value  to  his  country  by  the  establishment  of  The 
Tribune  and  the  character  his  genius  impressed  upon  it^ 
making  it  the  most  powerful  means  of  political  influence 
which  was  ever  exerted  by  reason  and  persuasion  and  peaceful 
appeal;  but,  as  we  have  seen,  he  also  conferred  notable  benefits 
upon  literature,  art,  every  good  reform ;  encouraged,  cheered 
every  attempt  at  progress  in  every  land;  constantly  directed 
all  peoples  onward  and  upward;  fearlessly  assailed  every  wrong 
and  every  abuse,  utterly  regardless  of  personal  consequences 
to  the  editor;  almost  daily  laboured  to  prepare  the  way  whereby 
all  peoples  may  settle  national  and  international  disputes,  all 
the  while  eliminating  progress,  without  appeal  to  the  barbar- 
ism of  war;  but  through  the  peaceful  means  of  intelligent 
public  opinion.  If  the  sublime  polity  which  Mr.  Gladstone 
and  Mr.  Bright  have  so  conspicuously  advocated  shall  be 
realized:  nations  learning  war  no  more,  injustice  and  oppres- 
sion giving  way  to  the  just  rule  of  democracy:  it  will  be  found 
and  cheerfully  admitted  that  in  bringing  about  a  consumma- 
tion so  greatly  to  be  wished,  The  New-York  Tribune's  early 
and  powerful  arguments  in  that  behalf  were  of  great  and  last- 
ing value. 


574  LIFE   OF   HORACE   GREELEY. 

Such,  in  briefest  outline,  were  the  inestimable  services  ren- 
dered his  country  and  mankind  by  Horace  Greeley.  It  will 
hardly  be  doubted  by  the  candid  that  they  were  greater  and 
better  than  those  which  many,  if  any,  of  his  (^temporaries 
were  able  to  perform.  During  all  his  wonderfully  active  life, 
and  though  the  greatest  honours  were  conferred  upon  him  by 
friends  and  the  widest  renown  by  the  world,  yet  he  never 
ceased  for  an  instant  to  be  the  devoted  friend  of  the  labouring 
man,  himself  ever  remaining  one  of  the  People — plain,  unos- 
tentatious, unsophisticated  in  the  indirect  ways  of  the  world. 
He  was  not  a  perfect  character.  He  made  some  mistakes;  he 
was  guilty  of  certain  solecisms  of  speech  and  of  breeding  which 
were  unfortunate,  but  never  of  any  malignity  or  premeditated 
unkindness.  He  was  a  great,  a  good,  an  honest  man,  whose 
worse  faults  were  rather  those  of  manner  than  of  character, 
and  whose  entire  unselfishness,  sublime  philanthropy,  magna- 
nimity more  than  of  the  earth,  work  for  man's  progress  and 
happiness,  make  a  lesson  which  can  forever  be  studied  with 
profit;  while  the  triumphs  of  his  wonderful  genius  can  only 
be  appropriately  recorded  on  the  pages  of  that  history  which 
shall  recount  the  most  important,  the  most  beneficent  events 
in  the  annals  of  his  country  and  of  his  times. 


cr> 


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